A Rollercoaster Pt 1
by eeveemew
Summary: It was… good that his sons had some company now. True, having four new humans dropping by the lair was…quite an experience. And with the Foot making deals with another shady syndicate, he hoped these new friends wouldn't be the last his sons ever made.
1. Prologue

I'm new to this, just a warning...

Disclaimer: This has been disclaimed

* * *

**Prologue:**

_There is nothing vaguely unique about this story. I'm sure it is like one you've heard before. Maybe it is even you yourself living the story. They are getting more and more common everyday after all. Tragedy is only the story of life._

_I'm an eighteen-year-old girl. Yeah, I know I don't sound it, and I'm sure the more I talk the less I will sound like one. But that's what happens when you're an abused child. It forces you to grow up quick, be precocious. I care nothing for the latest trends in pop culture; I do not make it my habit to speak ill of authority; I know zip about fashion; and you'll never catch me chit-chatting away with some friends about a hot boy. But no, it's not what you're thinking. My parents never abused me; they loved me. Not my teachers either, though they were strict Catholic nuns. My siblings had nothing to do with it—I am the firstborn after all. And my cat was ever kind to me. Who it was who twisted me into this emotional mess that I am now is none other than TS. Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the name, but I'm sure even you have heard the news stories or perhaps anxious whispers and tales of some horrible being. Perhaps you thought it was nothing more than a child's story, a fiendish nightmare of fairytales. I only wish that were the case._

_TS is an infamous "mad scientist", pervert, sadist, and kidnapper._

_I remember the day as if it were only yesterday. Bronx, New York, United States of America… The twentieth day in January was a crisp, windy day—just how I liked it (though, rain or shine, I'd probably like any day that came right before my birthday.) Oh, such excitement that filled my six-year-old mind!--or should I say seven-year-old mind? I would have never guessed what was about to happen that day._

_In that moment, as I waved goodbye to my good neighbor friend who had picked me up from school, all I was thinking about was the wonderful aroma of a freshly baked chocolate cake that would greet me when I stepped in the door. And I would run into the kitchen, proudly showing off my report card of five As and B+ to my mother, and inform her of some dreadful deed Kimberly Tanner had done in school; and I planned to ask her if the neighbors and my friend, Robbie, could come over; and I mischievously plotted searching the house for my gift. The next day would be my birthday party, daddy would be taking off from work, I didn't have any homework, the sun was shining, and things couldn't have been better. Life was this way, and it would always remain the same, I thought._

_But no one was home when I opened the door. The house whispered abandoned and only Mew came out to greet me. To this day I don't know what happened to them. I can only guess. I pray they had life easier than I. Who knows, something inside me refuses to give up the hope that they are alive still to this day._

_After I had searched the kitchen, dining room, living room, reading room, bathrooms, bedrooms, and backyard, an achy, bad, ominous feeling set over me, as if I was finally realizing that something bad had happened, was happening. It was in the attic—the one place I hadn't looked—a terrible something was waiting. Something named TS._

_I believe that is exactly what TS stands for: a Terrible Something, for it is indeed terrible and is indeed something. It is not a human I know, though it does appear as one. It, or she, is short but amazingly plump. Its stubby body ripples with fat, arms jiggling like jello, stomach protruding and sagging past its thighs which were thicker around than I was. Its face is a nasty face, not just ugly, but cruel and shrunken, wrinkled with evil, greased with impatience. It smiles whenever it senses pain in its victims, exposing disgustingly browned teeth and receding gums. Besides all this it is covered in warts like some mutant toad and exceedingly hairy in all parts of the body save the top of the head, which is sparsely covered. I screamed when I saw it, but it snatched me quick, nearly suffocating me in its thick, sweaty arms. I fainted._

_Life was just beginning to worsen._

_I'm sure you've all had your share of days where you just flopped into bed utterly exhausted, feeling overworked and underappreciated. Perhaps then you can sympathize with me. For the first three years under her 'care,' TS had me working—whenever she wasn't experimenting with me. Work started promptly at six in the morning and ended at midnight, giving me some six hours sleep—hardly what a growing child should have, but I survived, far better than some of the other girls she worked to death. In that place, exhaustion and malnutrition were common things to suffer from. At all hours of the day, girls were moving mysterious boxes, and heavy, awkward sacks around. Now this work you might find easy if not a bit tedious, but you must remember the general age of the workers. It was maddening besides. TS, whether because it honestly could not make up its mind or for the pure cruelty of it, would have someone move an object here, just to have them move it back again, up and down the stairs and up again, repetitive things that made anyone just want to yell at her and run away. Of course, no one would dare do that, and those who did were instantly killed. Yes, as I said before TS was notorious for kidnapping (only girls); I wasn't the only unfortunate victim. The cave TS had us holed up in continually smelt rancid of death, there was always someone being tortured, and there was always someone screaming, crying, or throwing up. Rats and spiders were everywhere for those that feared them, but that hardly mattered compared to the other girls. TS wouldn't care much for the mind of a child and would openly kill anyone in front of me, in the most brutal, unconventional, and gruesome ways. Soon I found myself wanting in even the four hours of sleep I ought to have had. Images of death were always before my eyes._

_I caught on to what TS wanted pretty quick. I learned never to cry after a month, and not to show any emotion if I could help it after a year. I wasn't to speak, and I wasn't to befriend any of the other girls. But I couldn't obey all those rules._

_I'm sure it was Providence that did give me a friend in that horrid place. Musashi Miyamoto, fire sprite and what a fire brand she was. She was one of the tougher girls who gave TS problems and yet always skirted punishment. She was tough with me too, but she also protected me when she could and saved me scraps of food. Sometimes when she was feeling very kind she would let me sleep in her arms while she sang me a lullaby softly, like an adopted older sister. She often confided in me, for I had become a silent type and a good listener besides. I couldn't confide in her though, for she hardly had the patience or the ability to listen. But still she was a dear friend._

_TS might have suspected something of the friendship between us and had us separated (for we had been in the same cell)._

_After three years had passed, TS actually expected us to spend our days learning martial arts, an odd turn of events and not so much better than before. Pardon me, it wasn't martial arts. It was unconventional really, more like 'do whatever you can to stay alive'. TS had created awful monsters in her experiments and we were to fight them or let them devour us. I don't even know why I bothered fighting. Death would have been such a sweet release—an escape from TS. I suppose I was too afraid, and it looked too painful. I really don't know how it was I survived those encounters. But I did for better or worse._

_I learned that it was for worse as soon as I turned twelve. Then TS' darker nature was revealed to me …_

_But that is all in the past; it doesn't matter. I have no time to tell you of such trivial things now._


	2. Chp 1: An Assignment

**Chapter 1: An Assignment**

It was a plain, bare room with little or no decoration. The walls were a dark red, and the carpet and furniture were cream. The window faced the east. There was a closet on the left, a desk laden with a few books, and a chair.

Uranusu Sydwell lay on top of her bedcovers, fully clothed in her black, skin-tight bodysuit, Dernier Vancour's blade at her side. Despite the uncomfortable appearance, she was asleep. But it was a light sleep and she awoke promptly at 5:48 am. She read, brushed her hair, and ate a meager breakfast, all of which took her ten minutes. She was going at a pretty leisure rate comparatively. She read because her education had been stymied as a child and because she loved to read in hopes that she could, in some way, make herself one iota smarter; she brushed her hair because it was a habit, long established in her and was necessary maintenance for its exceeding golden length; she ate only because she ought to and because she didn't want to faint about midday and put a strain on everyone.

With two minutes to spare, she was heading out her door with her pack, light but full of supplies. She had been a TEAM member for about three years, having joined when she was fifteen. And—what is a TEAM member? For crying out loud, don't you know anything about Nomékopian history? Well then, you must be introduced. Originally, really, TEAM was a noble group of heroes who protected the world of a forgotten age where ground and steel sprites still existed, grass sprites were more numerous, and the land was a greener, pleasanter place. It was probably just as the last of the fair elven race left the Grey Havens for the Sea beyond that an American sailed to the unexplored region of Nomékop. That American fell in love with the land the sprites kept beautiful (for sprites of that day indeed had taken after the elves) and swore to protect it against the growing darkness. And the darkness did grow, but TEAM—an allegiance of humans, sprites, and pocket monsters—played their part to hinder it.

Yet this TEAM that Ura is a part of is not that TEAM. That TEAM was destroyed long ago in the Battle of the Three Armies, as recorded in the Legend of Veruikha. The TEAM of today is a much smaller group of young warriors, allied with the government and police forces of Nomékop while remaining a privately-funded organization, seeking to keep justice and imitate that former greatness that was TEAM.

Ura reached the halls just as the grand clock struck six. She was the only one in the meeting hall: a great room of stone, whose ceiling was held up by many thick granite pillars and whose light came from the great fiery torches at each corner. Ura was the first one; she always tended to be for she was good at keeping schedules and was only ever early for meetings. She took her seat upon one of the rocks, pack in front of her and sat motionless for five minutes.

She was not so much worried about what she had been called in for. When mission time came, she had learned to be disconnected with herself in a manner of speaking. _She_ didn't matter. So whether or not the mission was hard, scary, or suicidal—whatever happened to her didn't make a difference. So long as none of her allies were hurt and the mission was completed, nothing else mattered.

Karen Sabishii was next to appear in the meeting room. She was tall, yet not so tall as Ura, but just as pretty as her. Her hair was shorter and a far lighter and brighter hue almost resembling the dandelions of the field; her skin was fair, not dark tan; and her eyes were violet, not crimson.

One might believe Ura felt quite uncomfortable in the presence of the winged woman who seemed to be in her mid-twenties; indeed, I'm sure you would if you were left alone with your clone, for that was what she was to Ura. Though they hardly looked alike, Karen had found her life in Ura's genetic information and had been raised in a test tube under TS' scrutiny. But Ura was not uncomfortable in the slightest for, as awkward as it may sound, she was close friends with Karen and ironically viewed her as a big sister. Truth to be told, Karen was naught more than five years old. But Ura cared not for the complications.

There were however deeper differences between the two companions (now conversing together in the quiet hall) than those already discussed. Karen seemed perpetually cheery, mischievous, clever, and solemn when occasion called. Ura knew far fewer moods: melancholy, anger, and depression. Karen was far more talkative and far more intelligent, diving deep into realms of philosophy, strategy, and science. In person, Karen was the wittier of the two, speaking eloquently with a silver tongue that dissolved opposition and rallied many to see her cause. She was a leader well admired and respected. Ura, as stated before, had limited knowledge and was quite self-conscious about it, yet she was practical and smart enough in everyday matters. She was always silent before strangers, shy, and hardly noticeable in a crowded room. Both were warriors but their characteristics were portrayed in their techniques for Karen would seek to outsmart an opponent most efficiently while Ura would be a follower, fighter of stealth and strength, a guardian and avenger. Karen had the wings of a hawk, while Ura was an ocelot.

Kojirou Sakaki next came into the room, smiling warmly and exchanging friendly dialogue with the two. He was their close companion and the only male on their small group of four. Ura rather liked him for he was sweet and gentlemanly besides young and good-looking. But even though her heart had jumped after his recent breakup, reality had set back in. He was showing an attraction to Karen, the smarter, happier, voluptuous one.

Ura didn't suppose anyone would ever love her.

She stayed rather quiet as the two talked, eyes distant.

Musashi Miyamoto came in, finally.


	3. Chp 2: Of Uncommon Valor

**Chapter 2: Of Uncommon Valor and Windows of the Soul**

Raquel Birkin skipped along the familiar path home from school, pink pigtails bouncing flamboyantly. She whistled cheerily to herself, turning her big blue eyes to the sky speared by sky-scrappers and dotted with fluffy clouds. It was the perfect day. But her brow creased in worry. Oh there were so many sweet boys in school so nice to her. She didn't know who she was going to choose: Lenard Bradbury had been making advances, but Gary Oak really had been her first choice, then there was Michael Koomton…

"Ow!" She cried, falling back after having bumped into someone. Tears in her eyes, she rubbed her forehead as she looked up, then she gasped in horror. Some Purple Dragon punk was towering before her. It was about this time that she realized that she had walked down a dark alley in a particularly more empty part of the city.

She screamed even as he grabbed her purse and took off.

Luckily for her, someone was watching.

With a roundhouse kick and an uppercut the thug was on the floor. The man in the brown trench coat and wide-brimmed hat gingerly picked up Raquel's pink, glittery belonging. "Here miss. I believe this is yours."

The young teenage girl stared at the green, three-fingered hand that offered her her belonging, frozen in fear. A sudden gust of wind blew off the hat of the guy, revealing a face just as green as the hand, masked in a blue headband. No visible nose, or ears, certainly not human—

"Stay away you… Frog Martian!" Raquel let out another ear-piercing scream before snatching her purse back and darting past him, tears streaming down her cheeks.

* * *

_She had been but twelve._

_The box had to have been just under six feet long, and about one and a half feet wide. There was a small group of air holes at the top out of sight, giving the impression that there were in fact none at all when combined with the utter darkness of the box. _

_Even with her thin frame she had hardly fit. Her arms could not rest at her sides but had to lie on top of her, and her legs were to remain pin-straight._

_The situation was made all the worse as Ura suffered from claustrophobia. _

_But TS ordered it. _

_So Ura had been forced into the coffin-like box, with little air, no light, and no movement, for about a good five hours. Even if she had not been confined she would not have been able to move, for her arms were tied. Her mouth had been taped shut. _

_The only things she could move were her eyes, which she did not like to move, for when she had her eyes open it was the same as having them closed. And that made her panic. _

_By the time she had been shipped to the house of six men, it seemed her limbs had forgotten their use and could do little to defend her as—_

--"I'm sorry to wake you, Ura." Karen whispered shaking her awake.

Ura promptly sat up, taking a deep breath of the crisp scent of pine, dismissing her dream as if it were nothing. But it wasn't a dream. She hadn't been sleeping. It was a memory.

Kojirou was cooking dinner over the open fire, and Musashi was still sleeping as usual. She was the late sleeper—really late.

They'd been given an assignment after all the formalities of the meeting had been said and done. The Rocket Dan had been acting up again; only, the said awakenings and stirrings had been in America, a region where the Gang was reputed to have no previous outposts. Apparently, their reach had spread. So, their group was getting shipped out to stop them from expanding, cut them down before they became ingrained in the district.

"Eat something, won't you?" said Kojirou to Ura, watching her nibble at the small amount of food she had taken.

She just stared at him plaintively. She would feel nervous—not because of the upcoming battle—but because she was home…in the state of New York.

She could hardly remember what the place was like. Her mind felt a mess; she was scolding herself because she thought she ought to have been focused on the very important mission up ahead, but she couldn't help wondering. Would anything be the same? Of course not…

She loved Kanto, Nomékop with all her heart: she'd give her life for it. But she had so been longing for an opportunity to return to her beloved, pollutant-filled, crime-infested city, notwithstanding. It was a sort of loyalty thing.

She couldn't shake the nagging feeling: a sort of anxious excitement that made her rather sick.

What if she could find her family? She had always hoped they were still alive, still missing her.

Ura shook her head, trying to clear all thoughts. She realized Kojirou and Karen were staring at her, but did not return their gaze, getting to her feet.

The city was just off in the distance: gleaming towers and lights piercing the night sky. She could get there before midnight probably. She was just so restless anyway; it wasn't as if she could sit still. It was unusual for her and her two awake comrades knew it.

She closed her eyes for a second catching an unusual scent in the air. Frowning, she opened her eyes and locked gazes with someone…far away, hidden in the dark shadows of shrubbery.

That moment seemed to last for hours.

They were the first to move, but Ura's gaze lingered a little while longer, not feeling worried or threatened, just intrigued. She hadn't been able to read much from those eyes. They didn't have a negative aura, though they did have a powerful, enigmatic, somewhat menacing one. Like you wouldn't want to get on their bad side because the body they belonged to was capable of dealing hefty damage, but they wouldn't attack unless provoked…like a snake. They wanted to remain unnoticed; and they were filled with such burden.

Funny, what the eyes could tell, even in so short a time. "Windows of the soul" or something.

"I'm…going for a walk…to scout ahead." She said to the others soft and causal, not forgetting about those powerful eyes, but not really going to do anything about them either. What was there to do? Follow them? "I ought to be back sometime tomorrow."

The two merely stared at her, but Karen relented with a nod. "O-kay…don't keep us waiting too long; we need to finalize the plans—and it's not safe out. None of us should wander alone."


	4. Chp 3: Of Rough Days

(Yeah I guess I do have mary sues of sorts; I thought she wasn't but…oh well, I guess you could view it as a parody, amateur writing, or whatever then…)

**Chapter 3: Of Rough Days and Setbacks**

It was pouring like it hadn't in months. The sky was unbelievably black and glowering, blocking out moon and star light.

Leonardo decided the only place to go was the park. He just wanted to be able to sit with his thoughts.

The rain was cold, freezing on his face and seeping through his trench coat, chilling his body past the thick flesh on his arms down through his meat to the bone. The paths were dark, but he'd walked them so many times he knew them all backward and forward.

He finally decided to stop and rest on a bench near Strawberry Fields of Central Park, a place he'd passed many a time where lovers sat, picnicked, kissed, drank champagne, and romanced. He frowned—another reason to dislike his life: he would never know love, not _romantic_ love.

He knew he'd be good at those things. He was a teenage boy, seventeen years old for crying out loud, and he wanted a girlfriend! He scolded himself for even considering the idea; he should have been happy enough just living and having a sentient life. Still…it would have been nice to have a picnic, and someone to love him unconditionally in that romantic way.

The rain came harder before it began to tail off. Leonardo was grateful for the rain; it left him alone in the park with himself. He needed alone time just like Raphael did.

He wanted to take off his soaking wet hat, but duty and responsibility forbade it, even if there was apparently no one around to witness his presence.

He felt no one understood him, no one listened, and no one cared that he took the burden of all his brothers on his shoulder…and he took it willingly. They didn't care—just looked to him for answers, expecting the right ones and accepting no less. He wished he could reject his role. He brooded that somewhere, sometime, when it was crucial, he would make the wrong decision, choose the wrong path. Why did they trust him?

He knew these bitter feelings would pass. He was just tired, worn thin, had a rough day…

* * *

"It feels like it was only yesterday." Ura said to herself lowly, daring to raise her gaze from the pavement to look around her. Sure, maybe the lawn was a little overgrown and the house was a different color. But it felt so…right, like she was six again, shouldering a backpack as she came home from school with her friend Robbie. There was even the same crack in the sidewalk that she remembered tripping on when she was playing tag. 

'_Funny, the things I commit to memory_.' She thought, slipping her hands into the pockets of her black leather trenchcoat. It hadn't taken her much time at all to find her old home, and she now stood before the walkway, dressed causally, sword, ears, and tail hidden. After all, this wasn't Nomékop—not that there were any warrior cat people there, but people were more likely to just stare blankly for a second before continuing on with their own business. She wasn't sure if the first person to see what she was would freak out and send her off to a lab, but she didn't want to take the chance until she tested the waters first and got used to things around her hometown.

It was sad really. Despite everything, if someone had asked, she would have insisted she was human. And she was; she really was. She just looked different and had sharper senses. She loved being what she was, regardless of who had turned her into this thing, but she didn't like the thought of humans not counting her as one of their own. She didn't want to be looked at as a monster. If it came down to mutants, aliens, and animals against humans, she'd obviously and instantly stake her claim among the latter group.

She supposed she shouldn't blame them for being so paranoid—too many horror movies.

But now she was just getting distracted. It must have been because she was so nervous.

Right, she was about to be reunited with her family.

The lights were on, presumably meaning someone inside was awake. Fighting emotions that threatened to consume her and trying to keep her excitement at bay, she began to move again.

'_What will I say? Will they recognize me? What will they look like after all these years….I don't suppose Mew's alive anymore…_' A million thoughts ran through her head even as she froze at the door.

Holding her breath, she raised her gloved hand and knocked.

Shortly a man with brown hair and blue eyes opened the door, stared at her quizzically and interestingly, and asked who she was.

'_Too young to be dad…yet…too old to be my brother…'_ She tried it anyway, forcing herself to keep her eyes on his face, "Are you Steve Sydwell?"

"No," His look changed to suspicion, "Why?"

She had been expecting failure, but still, she had hoped for success. She felt her ears wilting sadly and was glad for the black puffy hat on her head as she lowered her gaze immediately, "Never mind, my mistake; sorry to bother you, sir."

Only after she walked away and out of sight did she let out a sigh. For a moment, it had seemed so real, so close. Either they had moved away…or something bad had happened to them.

'_Alright, so you came and you saw, now move on and concentrate on your mission.'_

She sighed again, wishing it were that easy.

'_I mean it, stupid. You said you were going to scout, so go scout. Do something useful._'

Yes, doing her job should get her mind off her disappointment quite easily.

* * *

"I can't take just sittin' around and doin' nothing! I wanna bust some heads already!" 

"I already told you that we can't do anything yet. Unless you want to go around town asking people where our enemies are and whether or not we can reserve a personal meeting with them, you have to wait.

"We need adequate information before we can start planning. It all depends on just how primitive their new locations are—how many members are there, what kind of weaponry and equipment they have, and whether or not their communication systems are well working."

"Still doesn't mean I have to like any of this." Musashi growled, putting her swords away after having wreaked havoc on the nearby trees. "Couldn't you guys have at least sent me out with Ura on recon?"

Kojirou opened one eye from where he sat meditating passively, "You lack stealth skills." He said perfectly tranquil. His unmoved tone only irritated Musashi more.

Karen didn't bother say anything more than she had already said, too busy studying reports. It didn't look good.

* * *

"Can you believe that Master?" Said the young, cute, blond teenager with huge cherry-red eyes and black raven's wings as she paced around the ornate throne room, "Despite their alliance with _us_, those worthless, puny lil Dan'in went and made a deal with the horrid Foot in New York." 

"What course of action do you suggest we take?" An equally young male voice asked.

His advisor looked at him and blinked. "It's a choice between nobility and life—to submit to Oroku Saki is life but what a miserable one! Despite everything we stand for, Master, I do have a strong sense of honor. And he's just such a revolting person—if he even is a person. Ah, decisions decisions. It is you who must make the choice for your Gerard Foundation my Master. But I suggest we do nothing hasty. Allow me to go in your behalf to test the waters."

"Don't fail me." Said the boy, standing to his feet and reaching after her even as she started away. "And… be careful, Warui."

The girl only giggled, "And when have I ever failed you, darling?"


	5. Chp 4: An Encounter

**Chapter 4: An Encounter**

Everything had been going so well. She'd been able to catch some dan'in in the very act they were so well known for: stealing. And she'd been able to tag them with a tracker to find out where their base was exactly, presuming that's where they were going. They'd been sort of hard to follow, but that was a good thing, she thought, because that meant presumably that they didn't know they were being followed or weren't leading her into a trap. Still, basic stuff, nothing too hard.

The two oblivious dan'in had gone into some abandoned building and headed for the basement. How original (!). Ura was positive that there had been no trip wires or alarms where she was—she was a professional, she knew these sort of things. She had listened and smelt around; she hadn't thought there was anyone nearby. And then these…ninjas…yeah that's what they were. These dark-clad, masked, armed maniacs with a red marking on their clothes jumped out of nowhere and surrounded her.

She was certain it hadn't been a trap—they'd just gotten lucky.

A stealth mission only continues to exist so long as one isn't caught. Ironically, Ura felt more samurai-inclined herself and was pretty sure that these weren't the new police uniforms. They just screamed bad news. So she felt free to attack them.

They weren't the best of fighters, but they did have a high advantage in numbers, and all those strange ninja tricks, like running on walls.

And they kept pouring in from the rooftops, like roaches.

Ura swung her heavy sword around knocking them all back, leapt into the air, somersaulted, and smashed the pavement with her weapon, rattling the ground with explosions of bright, blinding, and particularly shocking ki. She had been fighting for a good four minutes, and as short as that may sound to you, it is long if you are constantly dodging, moving, attacking, and generally concentrating on staying alive, especially, if you have received quite a number of wounds from attacks you just couldn't avoid or block. Then just one minute could stretch into hours.

This last attack seemed as if she had finally finished off the threat, for it had grounded everyone and everything within a twenty-foot radius. Yet amid the groans of pain she heard footsteps. She leapt away from the sound, whirling in the air at the same time to face the menace.

The guy _had_ to be about 6'10'. He was insanely muscled, had a tattoo of a purple dragon on one bicep, another tattoo of the same odd red marking that the ninja had had on the other, and a trio of scars upon his jaw. Instead of some formal introduction, or even the silence of the masked ninjas, he merely grunted and roared as he ran for her.

Ura's ki reserves were low; she only had enough for one shot. Whipping out her bow even as he closed the distance, she flipped over his head and she fired another explosive amount of ki with him at close range. Lucky.

Satisfied as the clumsy animal crashed to the ground, she intended to head back to her partners for the moment to inform them of the meeting.

That's when a few Rocket dan'in stepped out and shot her in the back.

Ura fell to her knees in agony, silently cursing her incompetent carelessness even as they walked over to finish her off.

Then, like something out of some comic book, two shadowy figures came out of nowhere, swinging weapons and making quick work of the dan'in.

Ura forced herself to look up, try to get up and thank her heroes for crying out loud. They were hanging back a bit, in the dark, but she had night vision. She blinked, not believing what she was seeing. Then again, she had seen stranger, but usually the stranger were always on the bad side.

Must have been that hit on the head. They looked green…like giant lizards or frogs or…turtles…had to be…they had something round on their backs…

'_Whatever they are they saved your worthless life.'_ "T-thank you." She managed, still not quite sure if she was thinking or seeing straight. She squinted, seeing headbands on them: long, dancing in the wind, burgundy and plum…dandy, they were ninja too. They had weapons: twin sai and a …stick…no, bo staff was the proper term. At least they hadn't tried to kill her…or maybe they saved her because they wanted to kill her themselves. Muscular, anthromorphic, ninja turtles. Heh, that sounded funny. Ninja turtles.

She didn't think she had been hit _that_ badly on the head…

"Are you all right?" Asked a warm, youthful male voice as the one with the purple headband extended his three fingered hand towards her.

Ura felt herself smiling cynically. It was a silly question, but a polite one nonetheless and the most common and easiest to ask someone as an introduction, even if they were bleeding like a stuck pig. She hesitated for a second, but the voice was so…nice sounding. AND they had only just saved her life for crying out loud. She took his hand, shivering a bit at its scaly, reptilian yet oddly human touch.

She wasn't very well off standing though and remained rather hunched over, clutching her midsection, tasting blood in her mouth. She was vaguely aware of the turtle creatures talking amongst themselves.

Oh, wow, they could talk! That just hit her. Funny, she must have been daydreaming before. Well, it wouldn't be any more surprising than the rest of them.

What would be next? Dancing orcs perhaps?

"Thank you again…" She muttered; that was the only clear thing. "I…I'm sorry." Technically there was nothing to apologize about, but that was something Ura did commonly.

Then she collapsed.

* * *

Donatello swiftly moved to catch her before she hit the ground. 

Of course, they hadn't planned on letting themselves be seen—ninjas are shadows and are never supposed to be seen, let alone ninjas such as themselves. However, in this case it couldn't be helped. After all, they couldn't just strike the snipers from the darkness and leave when the victim had gotten critically injured.

This day just kept getting more peculiar. Well sure, Raphael going off on his own to brood wasn't bizarre, neither was larceny. But they had never seen bandits quite exactly like these. Aside from the common, nondescript black clothing and hats, they did have a rather striking scarlet 'R' emblazoned on their shirts, and they had these odd little monsters that came out of small red and white spherical containers. It was a fascinating concept.

And now in their pursuit of the thieves they'd run into the Foot, only they didn't really. They had been able to sit back and watch—ready to jump in and help at any time of course—as this rather attractive teenage anthro wiped them out. Perhaps she lacked flair and grace, but her methods worked well enough. She had even made short work of Hun. But unfortunately…

Donatello frowned both in concern and in indecision, tearing his eyes away from the bloodied form in his arms, "Well, we obviously can't leave her here."

"We could drop 'er off at teh hospital." Raphael suggested, not at all fond of this predicament. After all, just because she was an enemy of the Foot, it didn't mean she was on their side either.

Then again, even if she did want to stab them in the back after they'd saved her, she'd have to wait until she was at least able to stand.

Don shook his head, "I don't think so. I mean look at her." He said, he himself studying what looked like a perfectly normal young woman save for the big, spotted feline ears on top of her head and a lanky matching tail. Never mind that her teeth had looked a tad sharper as had her nails; and just a few minutes ago when she was in combat, the pupils of her eyes had narrowed to slits, reminiscent of an angry Leatherhead. "She's not exactly a typical human. It wouldn't be much different if we dropped one of our brothers off there. Who knows what they'd do to her; it's just too tempting."

"Lemme guess. You want ta bring her back to the lair?" He growled crossing his arms.

"I know Splinter will probably scold us, but I don't think we have any other choice. I would say April's but after what happened last time with the Foot, I don't want to get her involved."

Raph relented with a sigh, "Whatever we do, we better do it quick. She is bleeding a lot; and dis place won't be safe fa long."

* * *

"Ura should have been back by now!" The Japanese fire sprite growled. She had finally taken to the more constructive task of whetting her two scimitar-like blades, but she was getting excessively noisy with it. 

Kojirou grimaced; the sound of metal grinding against stone was setting him on edge too. "I know…"

"Well, let's go out and look for her!"

"Half a moment." Karen said slowly pulling a laptop from their bag of supplies. "Allow me to find out what I can about this _Foot_ that the Rocket Dan has allied itself with."

Kojirou nodded, "Then Musashi and I can go search. I hate the idea of splitting up even more, but someone needs to be _here_ incase Ura does return."

Musashi blew a few strands of hair out of her face, at least relieved that they were going to do something finally. She hated waiting.


	6. Chp 5: An Awakening

**Chapter 5: An Awakening**

Considering her awkward past, the situation in which Ura found herself wasn't half so surprising as one might think.

She was awake, but she didn't open her eyes yet. She used her acute senses of smelling and hearing first.

It wasn't exactly a very pleasant scent, certainly not a field of lavenders for sure. It was sort of open and airy, but there was also the smell of sweat, wax, dirty laundry, dust, metal, brick, electronics, tea, and…fresh pizza. She could even pick up faint and distant traces of sewage and garbage.

And she smelt turtles, or turtle people…the same two as before, as well as two more. They just seemed to be popping out of the ground. There was another smell: the smell of a rodent. But that wasn't surprising, considering all the other smells she was getting.

Well, really most of those scents were distant to a degree, as were the sounds of clinking and clanging of weapons, battle yells, grunts, and exclamations of pain or anger or even glee. Four voices she heard; and she lay completely silent as if still asleep, distinguishing them. She recognized the voice of the courteous purple guy, besides a deeper, machismo, agitated voice with a New York accent, a much higher, amused voice, and a sensible, gentle voice of some more elderly person…or turtle probably—Ura thought. The voices were nice sounding; she liked them from the start... Fortunately from what she was hearing, they were all just practicing and no one was trying to rip someone else's throat out, though it did seem as though the older person was training them and pointing out their mistakes as they fought.

She decided to stop torturing herself and just open her eyes already. She found that she was lying on a futon, in a pristine but dimly-lit room with a sort of Japanese feel to it. There were candles, tatami mats, paper lamps, books on ancient warriors, a few old katanas and ninjaken hanging on the wall, and…

She had to admit she was surprised. She wasn't alone. He'd been sitting there so quietly and concealed, she couldn't help but jump when her eyes landed on him. Yet, she recognized him, his eyes. He had been the one she'd seen the day she'd touched down in NY. He must have recognized her too. After all, a cat girl was just about as rare as a turtle guy.

For some reason she felt a smile coming on and she fought it, not wanting to seem ridiculous. Smiling about nothing…

"How are you feeling?" His voice snapped her out of whatever mental scoldings she had been giving herself. Amiable, noble…bordering even affectionate. Again she had to fight a shy smile—what was up with her? Sheesh, it seemed she fell for any guy who actually spoke politely to her, no matter what they were. Well, at least it was rare enough.

Oh yeah, how was she? She managed to sit up, partially, leaning on her elbows and looking herself over. She wasn't wearing her trenchcoat or olive green tube shirt anymore—but she could see the clothes had been cleaned and folded beside her Dernier Vancour and bow—leaving her in the matching mini-skirt and tights and a whole lot of bandages. Nearly her entire torso had been wrapped up, along with her lower arm, thigh, and so on—wherever she had gotten slashed at. The pain was muted and dull from painkillers, but it still existed and throbbed in vehement complaint to her movement. She felt weak and cold.

She let herself smile a little this time—but not that silly nonsensical smile—but a warm grateful one. These hero ninja turtle guys were unbelievable. Not only had they saved her from having her head blown off by the dan, but they'd taken her…somewhere, and fixed her up, and kept her from dying from blood loss or anything else, and this one with the cerulean-colored headband was even civil enough to keep watch over her.

"I'm feeling better." She lied, daring to direct that tiny smile at him. But those were the kind of lies she told. She was still in no great condition and would probably collapse after a minute or two of calm strolling. As if to prove her point she sat up more, fighting dizziness.

He returned the smile and Ura mentally sighed in welcome relief. "That's good to hear. Don't press yourself too much too soon though." He said, moving closer before pulling out an ornate Japanese tea set and pouring out a nice smelling herbal tea into two cups, offering her one.

In any other circumstance she might have been suspicious, but it seemed as though common sense had left her and she was just a naïve and curious child again, eager to make a friend.

The awkwardness of the situation must have finally caught up with her too. '_Imagine…drinking tea with a giant talking ninja turtle_…_teenage turtle_.' She amended, crimson eyes still snatching quick and cautious glimpses of him. And yet she was sure he was doing the same thing to her. Well as she said (or thought) before, cat people had to be just as rare as mutant turtles.

"I owe you all a greater debt than I can ever repay, sir."

"It was nothing." He held up his three fingered hand, "And please, call me Leonardo, or Leo."

Ura's smile turned into a full-blown grin, "Cool name. I'm Uranusu Sydwell." Man, she really had turned back into a child, in school, eating lunch with a boy.

"Really, Leo, if there's anything I could do to make up for all the trouble I caused you, I will do it." She said, turning serious again, "And the ones who brought me here, what are their names, and where is here…and what's going on anyway? Are you guys the new crime-fighting police force?" She frowned slightly, looking down into her cup, "Please don't think me impertinent. Everything's just so strange."

"You will know all you need to know, but perhaps you want to get some rest now. You haven't fully recovered."

Ura wondered how long she had been out. After all, if gunshot wounds didn't kill you, they at least kept you out of commission for a good number of days. "But I can't afford to rest. I have to hurry back to my teammates so we can complete our mission. I can't have them messing up because of me." She put her head in her free hand, "I just don't know what to do."


	7. Chp 6: Of Salutations

**Chapter 6: Of Stereotypes and Salutations**

"We are very flattered that you have extended your affable invitation to us, Mr. Oroku Saki." Said the lean man with short dark green hair in front of the small group of higher Rocket members all decked out in beige and blue outfits, all marked with a huge red 'R'.

Warui scowled, then pouted, then closed her eyes and shook her head, _'Shame, shame Clint Abernathy. Always such a hopeless kiss-up. Oh, but Basho Ohbari's down there too, and so is Francine Banks. What are you up to Mr. Sakaki Oda? Sending out your little underlings to the Shredder?'_

The whimsical dark sprite looked around, tuning out the boring exchange of greetings for a moment. The Shedder's palace was neat, with cool décor and nice toys, but the security had so many breaches, she didn't even need to use her powers of concealment or teleportation to get where she was. She just snuck in and had now taken a comfortable place above on the rafters, staring down passively below. Not to mention, there were some ugly experiments. Now, why did people always have to do that? Why couldn't they make pretty experiments, like herself?

Still she wished they had met outside in the gardens; she loved gardens. And that was funny. Typical dark sprites hated all things pretty. At least that's how they were stereotypically portrayed. Stupid stereotypes. She couldn't help but grin ear to ear at the thought of calling up her dark sprite minions and crashing in on the Shredder. That would be fun. Send him to the foggy nightmare world of Quiet Mountain in Eighth Tracking…

Anyway, what was going on? Were they done being boring yet?

Warui let out a mental sigh. Maybe she'd go sightseeing.

* * *

"You're teh one who has ta answer a few questions!" Raphael interjected. 

Things had been going rather smoothly. Michelangelo had successfully taught Raph a thing or two in their training lesson, and, after deciding it was time to back off rubbing it in his face before things got violent, he had plopped himself down on the couch to play the latest Eighth Tracking game. It was about that time when Leo came out of his room with that cute cat-girl behind him. Mikey grinned, leaving the game where it was, hopping over the couch to them, and introducing himself cheerily. Donatello of course just had to outdo him, and then Splinter came over. Raphael just sort of grunted his name from where he was abusing his punching bag. Then she said something like she "apologized for her ineptitude" and for trespassing on their hospitality, but Mikey merely scratched his head while Don said it was no problem.

The best part—well, besides the fact that she was going to live and all (they had been rather worried), and that she could fight real well, and was a hot girl their age—was that she wasn't a tad bit scared of them. Just intrigued if anything—but hey, they were intriguing! Mikey had been expecting a scream or a faint or something, especially when Master Splinter had approached her. But the cat didn't even hiss, despite sensei's slight apprehension. She seemed to see them as heroes instead of monsters. It felt good to be treated with such reverential awe. Maybe the fact that she wasn't exactly human either had something to do with it. Anyway, she had just begun to ask where she was precisely when Raph got all snappy on her. Mikey had to admit, he had been in a bad mood since he lost to him. Leo and Splinter and even Don gave him the look, but the cat girl, Ura, didn't seem to mind.

"Where should I start?" She asked meekly.

He must have been taken aback that she didn't get all snappy right back at him because he actually hesitated for a second before picking up his usual tone, "For starters you can tell us where you're from and why the Foot attacked you."

"The Foot?" She made a face, "Funny name. What's that? Do you mean those ninjas." She shook her head, "I can't read their minds; I don't know why. But I _was_ snooping around there because I had been following a pair of dan'in."

Now Mikey must have known how she felt just a second ago as he made a confused face, "Dan'in?"

"I suppose I ought to start at the beginning." Said she, taking to walking over to the 'dining room' table and absentmindedly running her lithe hand along the top of the chair. "I'm from Nomékop. You _do_ all know where Nomékop is…"

"The continent in between Japan and America." Splinter nodded, as did Don, though Mikey just made another face, having extremely limited knowledge of geography.

"I'm a member of TEAM, and I was sent here with three companions because we heard reports that the Rocket Gang was starting to grow roots here." She turned around and looked at them to see if they were following.

"TEAM?" Mikey made a happy face this time, immediately thinking of his third favorite comic series of these ancient warriors clad in silver mail, elementals with amazing power, and obedient little monsters who protected a faraway land from goblins, wraiths, and necromancers. "I didn't know TEAM was real! That is so cool!"

Ura looked at him, "It's probably not the TEAM you're thinking about…The modern TEAM is really just a small group, allied with the police force, a bare hundred stretched out across the country, and we can hardly stand against our enemies at home. The Rocket Gang is a particular pain; they are mainly a group of pocket monster thieves, but they have been known to participate in the black market, kidnappings, and assassinations. And we fear they are creating some sort of bio weapons." She again looked around to see if that was good enough.

"And now the Foot seems to be in league with this Rocket Gang." Don concluded.

"How d'ya get caught up in this mess?" Raph asked, sounding ever so nicer.

"What?" She held up her hands innocently, mock pouting, "Don't I get to ask you guys some questions now?"

"Wait! Wait!" Mikey raised his hand, "One more thing. You like pizza?" He grinned, seemingly producing a box of steaming hot, deep-dish meat-lovers from nowhere.


	8. Chp 7: Exchanges

**Chapter 7: Exchanges**

Raphael only gave half an ear as Splinter told Ura the familiar tale of their past: Hamato Yoshi's murder by the Shredder, Splinter's finding them in the green mutating TCRI goo, their learning ninjitsu, and their current struggles against the Shedder, Dr. Baxter Stockman, Hunnigan, Karai, and Agent Bishop.

She had been listening intently, happily eating a slice of pizza until she learned their pleasant abandoned-Y'Lyntian-outpost home was conjoined with the sewers. Then her appetite seemed to have left her.

She often cast glances at all of them, but Raph always looked away. She just seemed too good to be true; she had to be hiding something. After all, her account had been very general and impersonal.

"So now that you know everythin' bout us, I think it's high time ya tell us more bout you."

She didn't say anything for a moment, looking at the floor. Finally she stared at them all with an emotionless face, "What's to tell? It's not an interesting story. Just the common kidnapped and abused scenario." She shrugged callously, "A sob-story."

As everyone else's eyes bulged, Raph frowned—of course not the standard irritated or angry frown. It was a different kind. He felt sympathy tugging at him, but he was determined to get all he could out of her, perhaps still in disbelief.

"Was it Bishop? Did he turn you into a cat?" asked Mikey. Raph just smiled to himself, Mikey was _actually_ thinking and adding something of value.

"Ocelot." Ura corrected absently, "No." She said simply. "It wasn't him."

She sighed, supposing she ought to tell them, then continued with her unfeeling façade. Raph may not have been the most perceptive of people, but yet he could tell that she was going to mask emotions, about to tell the tale from a third-person perspective. He frowned again, beginning to feel rather bad for her without her even saying anything. That look on her face was enough. Either that or it was pretty good acting.

"It was TS, an obese old lady who—"

"Stay away from Ura, ya freaks!"

Mikey screamed his girly-scream and Raph was on his feet a second later as this Asian chick with shoulder-length, shiny crimson hair and enraged blue eyes appeared out of nowhere, pounced on the couch between Ura and Mikey, scimitar inches from his face.

"Musashi, no! Stop it!" Ura also got to her feet before either Mikey got cut in half or Raph attacked the intruder, grabbing her arm and pulling her away from the poor turtle.

Though none of them were in any direct danger any more, the maniac still had her weapons out, twirling them around dangerously, "These monsters kidnap you or something Ura? What happened to you anyway?" She demanded, seeing the bandages, "All right! Which one of you creeps did this to her?"

At this point, Ura had to draw her own sword, stepping in front of Don and Leo and parrying Musashi's swipe. "Musashi. These. Are. My. Friends." She growled, pushing the hot-head back, "I was attacked in the streets and they saved my life!"

"Yes, Musha, do calm down. The fact that we found her sitting quite comfortably among them should be reason enough to conclude that they are not a threat." Spoke another voice.

Musashi had been so demanding of attention, that the other intruder had gone completely unnoticed: Asian guy with long lavender hair and emerald green eyes who appeared to be levitating.

Musashi seemed to fume for a second more before slipping her weapons into sheaths behind her back, "Kay…so…what are they anyway? Goblins?"

Raph had just about had it. "Listen lady! It's bad enough that ya just barged into our pad without any explanation and tried ta attack us 'gainst all reason, but now here ya are standin' in OUR home, insulting us!"

Musashi just smiled haughtily, "I guess you want some sort of apology? Did I hurt your little feelings?"


	9. Chp 8: In the Sewers

**Chapter 8: In the Sewers**

Karen stood above the manhole, shaking her head dismally and backing up in disgust as the stench rose from below. She hated to admit it, but she was one of the more queasy of the group…and hated bugs besides…Grimacing and taking a deep breath of the fresher air, she got down on her hands and knees and started down the long ladder, soles of her boots clanking loudly in the dank, musty silence.

Sure, Kojirou could have just teleported her to their location, but he hadn't been able to because he'd lost his focus and she hadn't been able to get in contact with him since. All she knew was their location, that Ura was fine and in the company of some unusual warriors, and that Musashi was being her typical charming self.

She sighed, for the moment, truly disturbed by her partner's attitude. She probably shouldn't bother think about it, overreact. Some people were just like that. OR maybe Musashi had something really wrong with her head…or maybe both…

She scowled at the wet little platform beside the stagnant brown water and tried not to gag. Sure, she was a warrior—she'd once had the misfortune of stumbling across a mound of cadavers, five days old and rotting in the hot summer sun—and though this didn't compare to that, it wasn't at all pleasurable.

Steeling herself, she started forward. Even were it not for the smell, the place made her uneasy. Reminded her far too much of the Shining Code. She growled at herself. And she'd been thinking too much of video games. Forget the Shining Code and Eighth Tracking—she'd been in real-life situations like this: dark, confined area with blind corners and unidentifiable sounds. She kept a hand on the hilt of her sword.

So, where was this place? All he had given her was the street names—on the crossroads of Eastman St. and Laird Ave. by the abandoned warehouse. She had hoped just to walk right in, if it were out in the open, but for all she knew it was utterly concealed with some random pipe as the switch to some hidden location. "_Kojirou..._"

He must have been able to concentrate now, because her groan of frustration reached him.

She found herself standing in quite a different place. Architectural beauty, slightly dilapidated from age though it was. Huge, light-colored, terracotta bricks domed the spacey area; turquoise panels framed the many doorposts, leading away to many intricate antechambers; and just above was a balcony, unbroken, stretching around the length of the room, with many more doors. Square pillars led to the top and the place was lit up by a single, bright glowing crystal in the center of the dome.

She longed to go on in her surveying, but before she could wander around, her eyes caught sight of something, and it wasn't the furniture.

There was Musashi, arguing, fighting, insulting, and generally making a lot of commotion with a giant, red-masked, anthropomorphic turtle. Karen didn't so much as blink—it all seemed so normal to see Musashi rolling around on the floor wrestling with a mutated terrapin, never mind the other three and the rat. That's what happened when you grew up in a test tube. Those four creatures and Kojirou and Ura were standing around watching, either because it was hopeless to pull them apart or because they didn't want to wind up becoming the new punching bag. Fortunately, it didn't seem too serious either. Maybe that was just the way tough people greeted each other.

Still.

Karen calmly walked over as Musashi had just started pinning the turtle; grabbing her by her hair, she managed to drag the protesting fire sprite off of him. "Musashi Miyamoto, what do you think you're doing? You disgrace your TEAM." Karen sighed and let her go. Musashi merely sulked and muttered something under her breath but listened for once.

Karen turned towards the mutant creatures and bowed, "I apologize for the trouble my junior officers have caused you all."

"What? Me and Raphie were just communicating on a deeper level." Musashi smiled innocently.

Raph just sort of scowled, but his fury had left him some time ago when they had stopped trying to kill each other. "Don't call me 'Raphie'."

"Awe, but it's so cute."

"Do you mind, Miyamoto?" Karen frowned at her before turning to the creatures, "I believe I also have to thank you for the recovery of my other junior officer, Uranusu. You will be repaid for your gracious generosity and kindness."

"Of course! We accept cash, personal checks—ow!"

Karen felt a tiny smile on her lips as she watched the interaction between Mikey and Raph. Yet she felt in an awkward place—Ura was hardly better and she would have liked to ask these guys some questions, but after Musashi's display she doubted if they were welcome.

* * *

"—And from that day on Mikey nicknamed himself the Turtle Titan." Raph concluded his tale rendering the happy group at the table either chuckling or incapacitated from laughter.

Mikey merely scowled, feigning offence, "Well, I DID help defeat Silver Sentry's arch nemesis Malignus."

This was… nice. Ura couldn't think of a better word. 'Nice' didn't cover it.

It felt like one of those golden, spring days: the sun was setting and a gentle breeze blew cherry blossom petals through the air like snow.

Well, probably not half so peaceful and quiet. They were teenage boys after all. Perhaps it was more of an exciting happiness—like the kind one gets when…when coming up to the best part on one's favorite rollercoaster.

Ura couldn't recall the last time she'd felt so…happy…let alone laughed. Sort of gave her a heartache—bittersweet.

Splinter had let them stay, and they were eating pizza together, talking like old friends. Everything was forgiven. Everything just seemed so right.

She wished it could last forever.

Actually the rollercoaster must have been a good symbol—with all its twists and sudden drops.

"So…What are we going to do about the Gang and the Foot?" Someone asked.

Everyone got serious again. Yeah, see, it was a rollercoaster. Happiness had already passed.

Karen leaned her cheek in her palm. "Nothing so soon." She said after a while. "If they're already together, then we're going to have to rethink our strategy."

"What?! And waste more time?" Musashi growled. "The longer we wait the stronger they're gonna grow."

Karen went on, as if she hadn't heard Musashi, "We'll need to find a base of operations and perform several more reconnaissance missions…I'm hoping we'll be able to create a loop-hole in their relationship and get them to fight internally, but that's going to require a great amount of skill, wit, and deceit."

"And I say we're nine people—er, fighters." Musashi slammed her fist on the table, looking around at the turtles and rat, voice raised enthusiastically and frustratedly, "We just split up and kill the two bosses in charge. Everything else would crumble."

"Very foolhardy indeed." Karen's voice was always calm, reasonable, "There are hundreds of goons between us and the bosses, not to mention that the bosses themselves won't be easy to defeat. We need contingencies. And very presumptuous of you to assume our new acquaintances will want to join this insane mess and make themselves a target." Karen was so cool and collected it made Musashi all the angrier.

"We're already a target for the Shredder." Mikey interjected, hoping to lighten the escalating pressure. All the while the four turtles had been looking at Leo and Raph respectively, then back at the two combatants.

"I'm sure my sons would be honored to aid you."

"That is most gracious, sir Splinter." Karen gave a bow, "Especially considering the tumult we have caused."

"Oh please." Musashi rolled her eyes at Karen disgustedly, "And stop making _me _look like the bad guy. Who ever died and made you leader anyway? My ideas are just as good as yours!"

"Maybe if you actually took the time to stop and think about it, then you'd realize the complications that may arise with the berserker-style of fighting in cases such as these." Kojirou took Karen's side. "We're going up against two, million-dollar—"

"Yeah, I know, I was here, I heard. I'm not as stupid as you'd like to think."

Ura sighed, feeling miserable again. Yes. Things were back to normal.

Eyes narrowing in determination, she started for Leo's room again.


	10. Chp 9: Topside

**Chapter 9: Topside**

Leo wasn't very fond of going topside, not during the daytime at least. Fewer shadows to hide in and many more chances of being seen. Not that he planned on letting his ninjitsu skills slip. But it was a challenge in such a crowded city.

He'd spied Ura sneaking out of the sewers, with her sword and some other things.

He didn't know what that meant: whether she had just gone looking for fresh air or whether she was running to report everything she'd heard to Bishop. He had his doubts, but he wasn't as suspicious as Raph was. And that look in her eyes…seemed to say trustworthy.

That and so much more. Those moments they'd shared locked in each other's eyes…were so incredibly deep…one warrior to another.

He was sure she wasn't deceptive; she wouldn't betray them.

Leo froze when Ura happened to look up and see him, spying on her from the rooftop. As if to further prove his point she gave him a grin, came out of her former gloominess, ran into the alley, leapt onto the fire escape, and made her way up.

"Man, you're good; I hardly heard you—and that's saying something coming from me. But I did catch your scent." She said all in one breath as she stepped out onto the roof as well.

"What are you doing out here?"

"Sightseeing. I was particularly hoping for an unguided tour through a certain 'abandoned warehouse' I visited earlier this week."

Leo raised an eye ridge, "You should know better than to go alone. You're not even in a condition to fight."

She looked down guiltily, reminiscent of a younger Mikey caught stealing the last pizza pie, "I don't have to fight if I'm not seen. And I won't be seen."

"Well, I'm coming with you."

She grinned again, "Good! We'll make a great stealth team!"

* * *

Leo decided she was right. She wasn't a ninja, but she had some skills; and at this point, Leo felt more like a shapeless and noiseless shadow than he would if he were with a certain brother, not giving any names.

The security rested heavily on the second floor, with a couple guards lounging around below. Looked like the enemy was smart enough to know better than to have a whole army out there—that would look suspicious. The ground was really guarded by cameras.

Ura had done several stealth missions to Dan hideouts before. She had suspected that everything was underground; the building was just a fancy entranceway. That's how the Rocket Dan operated.

Suddenly Leo couldn't help but wonder how long she had been doing this sort of thing…and if the Gang did all of that 'bioengineering' stuff…What if she had been captured once before and turned into what she was? She hadn't gotten to explain it, but he doubted she was born like that.

Leo narrowed his eyes. Whatever the case, he couldn't ask her now, and he shouldn't be thinking of that now. He had to stay focused: on his mission, on his surroundings…

He voted entering from above, where they least expected it. He thought this might pose a problem for Ura, but it turned out she was just as ready as he was to scale walls and cut through glass. She even pointed out the single sniper on the roof and eliminated him before the whole thing began.

Once they were in, they stopped communicating verbally.

They didn't short-circuit the cameras—they just avoided the gaze of their patterned turns. Ura reasoned that they didn't want to jeopardize any further dealings by getting the Gang suspicious now.

They had first intended to make it quick and sweet, just browse the area and make some mental maps, but Ura got another idea as she observed a pair of dan'in walking down the hall. Motioning to Leo, the two of them grabbed the hapless minions as they passed, clamping their mouths shut and knocking them out, dragging them into the darkness.

Ura merely grinned humorlessly at the unbelievable convenience. It was as if some psychic decided to give them a hand. The outfits would fit the two of them nicely.


	11. Chp 10: Reflections

**Chapter 10: Reflections**

It was… good that his sons had some company now. Of course, Splinter had been a little apprehensive when Miss Miyamoto had entered the picture.

His trust wasn't blind. He was well aware that the fight above could have been staged in a costly yet effective way to get on the inside and get them to lower their guard. Or they could have all been androids, ready to turn on them at any given moment. Not to mention the fact that they could still turn them over to the scientific community of either their government or the Nomekopian one. Yet this was another instance in which he felt he could 'trust his gut' when he looked in their eyes.

He breathed deeply, inhaling the aromatic lemongrass incense. Kneeling upon the mat and setting his walking stick aside, he couldn't help but chuckle slightly. He had always felt bad that his sons would never be allowed to associate with others. They were forever cut off from the world above. The very humans they fought to protect would turn on them in hate and disgust if they were discovered. For the greater part of their lives thus far his sons had been each other's only support, learning to draw on the companionship of one another, as well as learning how to fully irritate each other.

The scene that had transpired just a while ago had been full of irony. It was as if Leonardo and Raphael had been able to glimpse at each other from another perspective. Not that it would hinder further arguments…

He closed his eyes, thoughts drifting to less pleasant and more serious matters. It seemed hard enough to defeat the Shedder alone, but now they had to deal with another adversary they knew little about.

He meant it fully when he had offered to help their guests. Still there were certain things he had not taken into consideration. Not even he was completely without faults after all.

Sighing tiredly, he resolved to meditate upon it for a time.

* * *

Musashi yawned and then grabbed another handful of popcorn, "I hate these movie remakes of games. They suck. Like, are the directors even serious? It would be funny if it weren't so pathetic. They totally screwed the RE storyline, not to mention, Olivera is NOT supposed to look like that. He's SUPPOSED to be some hot, clean-shaven, teenage Hispanic guy. That's my main gripe." 

Mikey shrugged, "Light on story, heavy on gory."

"Salute to that!" She popped him a fluffy kernel which he caught in his mouth.

The fight had died down and now things were like nothing had ever happened. Mikey, Musashi, and Raph were watching movies, Karen and Donatello were sharing a highly sophisticated and intelligent conversation, Kojirou had sort of melted into the background, and Splinter had retreated to his room.

"Want?" Raph asked from his seat on the floor, offering Musashi a bottle of beer.

"Nah, I don't drink." Musashi tilted her head back over the arm of the couch, delicately, almost seductively, eating a chip.

"Well we have soda." Mikey also offered from the floor. Raph just frowned, not sure if he remembered her drinking _anything_ while they had been eating.

"Nah. But if you have oil, I'd go for that, preferably sunflower."

Raph shot her an odd look. She was perfectly serious too.

She cracked a grin at him, "What? I don't like the burning feeling generally associated with liquids and me." She showed off, igniting a flame and cuddling it in the palm of her hand as if it were a little hamster, "I'm a sprite, y'know."

"No way!" Mikey suddenly lost interest in the movie, "They're real?! Elementals?"

Musashi was very pleased with all the attention, "Yep." She went back to lounging on the couch, "I'm surprised you haven't seen any before—but then again, we have been known to be indistinguishable from humans until we unveil our power." She chuckled, thoroughly enjoying herself and the new fan she made.

* * *

"I can't believe it. You've got to be pulling my leg." Donatello said in soft amazement. "I mean, an 'experiment'? Sounds too harsh. You sure you're not an Avian instead?" 

The two had rather hit it off, chatting about anything and everything. Had his brothers been paying attention, they might have found it odd that the usually introverted turtle could be so talkative. Then again, he did get excited when discussing scientific things, especially when someone understood what he was talking about, though Karen's fields were more strongly psychology and strategy than say microbiology, engineering, and bio-organics. But at least she had an appreciation for the deeper side of life.

"Well," She grinned, "how many normal humans do you see with wings?"

After a moment's hesitation, he reached out, gingerly fingering her brown and white feathers, eyes wide and voice low, "So soft, and so elegant and natural. Incredible."

Karen sort of looked to the ground shyly, "You're pretty amazing yourself."

Before the awkward silence could set in, Mikey's outburst conveniently distracted the two.

"Can you believe it Donnie? We have a professional pyromaniac in our midst!"

Both Karen and Don peeked out of his scientific alcove at the hyperactive turtle. The former merely shook her head, while the latter leapt out to join the others, his curiosity intrigued.

"Hey, do all fire sprites have red hair?"

"No."

"Do they all have bad tempers? Cuz in the movies the fire sprites are always the impatient mad guys with red hair…and the water sprites are always cool and calm and blue-haired, and the electric sprites are blond and bouncy, ice sprites are cold, and the dark sprites are—"

Musashi's eye twitched, "No, Mikey…forget those lousy movies."

"So it's only you?"

"Raph, darling."

"What?"

"Shut up! Anyway, I can, not only control fire, but also cause it, and either increase or decrease its effects." She motioned, causing a nearby unlit candle to flare up, "It doesn't hurt me, in fact it only hurts those I want it to hurt," She merrily shot a ball of fire at Mikey, who screamed nonetheless, "I could breathe it, like say a dragon, but such is considered barbaric of _nobler_ sprites, not that I care. But my powers aren't unlimited." She admitted grudgingly, "As a level 23, I could 'run out', get tired real quick, and relatively speaking, my fire isn't really as hot as it could be. But when I level up more, like to 50, I'll be unstoppable! I could cause explosions, summon fire cats, and reach deeper into all the secret fire moves like Hi Bakuhatsu, and Byakkimosyuken, and all fire pocket monsters will obey me! Of course, I could really show you my powers in battle." Said Musashi proudly, finishing off her dance with fire, "When are we going to fight anyway?"

Karen didn't answer Musashi, but merely looked around, slightly bewildered. She'd been so involved in asking Don about all his security and communications systems, she hadn't realized— "Where are Leo and Ura?"


	12. Chp 11: Of Impertinence

**Chapter 11: Of Yukina and Impertinence**

The rattling had startled her—she had completely not sensed anything down the long empty hall. In fact, she might have dropped dead from the surprise. To have someone desperately banging on the door you were just passing by, interrupting the silence and threatening your courage and stability, was certain horror film scenario.

She felt rather ashamed for visibly jumping—Leo had remained perfectly composed. It stunk to act so incompetent in front of him. Who was that anyway? She looked at him, then at the blurry face of whoever was on the other side. Since it didn't look like a monster, and she just couldn't ignore pleas for help, she unlocked the door.

Out tumbled a lady with ice blond hair, eyes squeezed shut, one hand gripping her opposite arm. She wasn't wearing the standard rocket uniform, neither grunt nor elite level, rather she wore a white body suit. Wherever it was exposed, her skin was wet, raw, and bloody. Like… Ura turned away, hand on her head, reliving some past trauma concerning acid.

The room she had come out of was burning red with heat like a furnace and Leo shut it back up pretty quick.

"You must stop them." The ice sprite pleaded, "Who knows what they plan to do with it."

Seeing Ura was in no shape, Leo took the initiative, "What are you talking about?"

And how was it that she was trusting them anyway?—they looked just like any other dan'in. Did she know they weren't? Or what if she was on the wrong side anyway and they shouldn't "stop them"? Who was she? And why had she been locked in that death trap?

It appeared those were all questions they'd never know the answer to. For someone critically injured, she took off sprinting rather fast and was gone down the corridor. Leo tried to pursue her, but it seemed as if she had just disappeared around the corner.

It made no sense. He didn't like feeling so utterly bewildered. What was worse, he didn't know what to do next.

Ura placed a hand on his shoulder, "Well?"

* * *

Kojirou scowled deeply, not saying anything, though he could have easily helped the situation by locating Leo and Ura. Unlike his two comrades, he did not like the current state of affairs and had only been perfectly civil when confronted, though he had made it a point to avoid being confronted.

It wasn't that he didn't trust them. He was psychic for crying out loud; he could read their minds. It wasn't like he was scared of them.

He supposed he was just jealous. Karen and Musashi had pretty much left him out of the picture to hang with their new friends. He realized that he had taken for granted the previous enjoyment and envious position of sole male in league with three attractive females. He scowled some more. And what was Karen so happy about, smiling and laughing like that with that Donatello—he didn't find anything particularly funny about the dangerous, life-threatening position they were in. She was probably what bothered him the most…or should he say Donatello.

Musashi had broken up with him after all—he didn't mind that she and Michelangelo were playing videogames. And who knew what Ura and Leo were up to. Well he could know. Just as he was getting curious and bored enough to find out, they just happened to walk in the door.

He could tell from the black bodysuit that she had gone on recon—so typical of her to always 'get extra credit' as Musashi would say. Always the most serious about their task. And that's what he liked about her. He couldn't help but scowl at Leo too. Man, he was just in a bad mood.

Everyone else seemed to notice that they had returned, Musashi even bothered to look up from the game, but Ura said nothing. She merely emptied her bag of goodies on the table: key cards, floor plans, security codes, a couple of daily files. Then she backed away and stood as if at attention, probably still on her formality-mode. Karen was over there in a split, looking over all the information and giving them both the thumbs-up. "Now we have something to go on…"

"So, you guys finally all cooled down?" Leo asked. Musashi merely gave him an innocent confused look as if she didn't even know what he was talking about.

"Where were you two?" Kojirou asked, trying not to sound accusatory.

"Having fun without us eh?" Raph asked, picking up the key card marked with the crimson 'R'.

Ura merely stood to the side rigidly as Leo explained things. Despite her earlier happy friendliness, she seemed to be back to her old self now. She felt out of place, useless now that the impromptu mission was over. In fact, she even felt shyness creeping up. She still hadn't quite gotten over her 'mission-mindset'. _There when you need it, not there when you don't. Just stay out of the way and don't cause problems._ She scolded herself, looking at the ground. It was funny really; she had been so much more open around the turtles before her teammates crashed in.

Leo, having finished his tale, looked at her, "You spacing out over there?"

She shook her head and walked over to him, looking down at him, "What now, Leo?" She said his name with hesitance, just barely biting back from saying 'sir'.

"Uh," He raised an eye ridge, confused by her behavior, "Well I think we ought to take the rest of the day off for sure."

"Yeah, you should definitely take it easy." Donnie agreed, putting a hand on her shoulder, "We don't want you to have a relapse. In fact I should check your wounds. With all the strain you put on them they might have started bleeding again. I really don't think you were ready for that."

Ura sort of melted at his touch, allowing herself to relax out of the stance and allowing him to lead her away to the couch.

"What time is it?" Musashi asked from where she sat comfortably alone in front of the entertainment center (for even Mikey had left to go say his greetings).

"Going on 12:30." Karen said, then frowned concerned, "…We should get going."

From where he was, Kojirou smiled.

"Aww! But I was just starting to have fun!" Musashi complained.

"We cannot trespass on our friends' hospitality, and it's not like we can sleep in the sewers." She mentally grimaced. "We will find a hotel nearby." She gave a slight bow, "Give your sensei our thanks."

"Sleep? Who's sleepy? Let me at 'im." With a growl, Musashi left her comfortable spot and stood beside Karen while Kojirou took the other side. Across from them stood Raph, Mikey, and Leo, who bowed, waved, and see-ya-later'ed respectively.

"I want to stay." They all turned to look at Ura. Her hand flew over her mouth, "I mean—I should very much like to stay—if it is at all agreeable. Please forgive my impertinence! I really don't mean any trouble."

"S'all right." "Sure, no trouble." "Of course." "Sweet!" Came the respective responses.

"If it's all right with them." Karen consented.

As for Ura, she fell to her knees, "Thank you! I promise I'll be good—you won't even notice I'm around!"

Kojirou merely frowned, not thinking it was wise to leave Ura surrounded by four guys, mutated animals or otherwise. But again, that was probably just jealously talking.

"Oh, hey." Don ran over to his alcove and ran back, "I managed to whip up something for you guys so we can stay in contact." He handed Karen two shell cells. "Due to the time restrictions, that was all I was able to manage." He grinned sheepishly.

"You _made_ these?" Karen ran her sleek fingers over its surface before flipping one open and inspecting it. She smiled softly, "Thank you, Donatello. You're something else."

Kojirou's frown deepened as the two locked eyes for a moment before Karen turned to leave. At this rate he couldn't even focus enough energy to tell how serious she was—whether she was flirting or just telling it as it was or both. After all, not many people could construct such an amazing piece of communication and tracking equipment, from scratch, in so little time, let alone a mutated turtle with no formal engineering degrees and no proper equipment and only three fingers. Yeah, pretty incredible; Kojirou grudgingly gave ground.


	13. Chp 12: A Sleepover

**Chapter 12: A Sleepover**

"All right, let's get you situated." Said Don.

"You can stay in my room." Leo offered.

"Oh no, Leo. I couldn't intrude. I wouldn't mind sleeping out here on the couch."

"The couch isn't that comfortable." Leo objected.

"Besides," Don nodded in that general direction. Mikey and Raph had since resumed the game they had started earlier. They were both looking a bit aggravated, and their more level-headed brothers both knew it was only a matter of time before something happened. "You need your rest if you're ever to recover. I doubt you'll get any out here."

In fact at that very moment Mikey dove behind the couch as Raph shouted at him—something about cheating. Mikey retaliated: "C'mon Raph! Why can't you just admit that you're not as good as me?" At the murderous look on Raphael's face, Mikey added sheepishly, "…At videogames?"

Long story short, soon the two were back on the floor, totally absorbed in the game again. Must have been a good game for Raph to let Mikey off with just a headlock.

Donnie shrugged, figuring his point had been proven, then headed towards his computers.

"Really, Ura. I insist. Take my room and make yourself at home."

She debated with herself what would be causing more trouble: accept his offer or keep arguing about it. "Thanks Leo." Said she with a bow. Her old curiosity which had been under check began to surface again, because without a word nor inquiry for approval, she began to walk away, sniffing around the place, eager to explore, looking very much like a cat in a new environment. It wasn't long before she found the snoozing Klunk.

Leo just watched out of the corner of his eyes, smiling.

* * *

"Now that was just strange!" Musashi exclaimed with a mild curse. Then she flopped down upon the sofa of the Golden Prince Hotel room and flipped on the tv as was her habit.

Karen didn't say anything, unpacking and assorting the things they had brought. From the sewers they'd found their way to the nearest manhole cover, and then the nearest inn. She estimated that they were about a mere two blocks away from the lair. She and Musashi had had a minor argument over which kind of room to get—Musashi wanted all the luxuries New York had to afford while Karen merely wanted a place with four walls and a roof where they could hideout in. In a compromise, they'd acquired a modest suite, which Musashi deemed ritzy enough and Karen found within their budget. The first thing Karen had done was hop in the shower. Musashi merely laughed at her.

"I mean, c'mon! You can't honestly say that they didn't shock you one bit, Kar."

"It was like something out of a sci-fi movie." Kojirou joined in for the sake of it.

"Or a game." Musashi countered, scowling at the flickering screen in the dim light and then muttered to herself something about there being nothing to watch in that part of the world and wishing she had brought her Phoni Cam 2 and some games like Itchy Tasty 4 or Water Will Tell.

"Knock it off." Karen said, slightly irritated with how the two were talking behind the turtles' back—Musashi she could expect that level of maturity from, but Kojirou? It seemed being around their new acquaintances had brought out the worst in him. She truly couldn't recall ever seeing him act so petty and aloof. "I see nothing wrong with them. I think we were very lucky to find them too. True, it isn't the _most_ common thing I'd expect, but so what, Musha? Ura and I aren't exactly common either. What's your point?"

She shrugged, "You're sooo agitated, Karen. I think the change in the air pressure wasn't good for you."

Karen went back to ignoring Musashi's baiting and started to look over the files Ura and Leo had snatched. They just so happened to be scientific documents recording various experiments conducted within the Dan's new, temporary facility. Even if she weren't so inclined to that field, she would have found them valuable sources.

Perhaps they should consider handing the files over to the local police… But that wouldn't be good should their friends somehow be involved, then it also would cause problems between the two governments, and even a potential for war if things got out of hand. Although TEAM had at one time been a global operation, now they were pretty much restricted to their own country due to lack of funds and members and isolationist tendencies at home. So in the end, the turtles and rat would be taken away to be treated like animals—at best—in some lab or zoo, and the TEAM members would incur the wrath of the United States for exercising military\vigilante methods without the government's permission.

Besides, this was beyond the power of the local police force to handle.

And by the looks of things, the dan'in had bought over some of the officers in the department as well. She wouldn't put it past them.

"What if they can't even fight?" Musashi pointed out, "Or what if they're real lousy fighters—it'll stink for me to have to protect them besides protecting you guys."

"They are good fighters." Kojirou admitted slowly. "Even those without the mind's eye can tell. They are young and fit. Their movements are marked with agile care, and their eyes all show the toil and concern that the path of a warrior yields."

"Toil and concern? Bah." Musashi merely shrugged again, "Whatever Koji; I'm just looking forward to seeing them in action."

The conversation seemed to have ended, the noise of the tv blocking out the rustling of papers and almost Karen's thoughts. Suddenly Musashi burst out laughing. "Man that's funny! You know how ridiculous you sounded—all that honor and warrior wisdom stuff? They're turtles for crying out loud!"


	14. Chp 13: Of Time

**Chapter 13: Of Time**

Ura was a light sleeper. She woke up at 4:52 a.m., instead of the usual 5:48 a.m. She blinked, suddenly realizing she had no way of being sure what time it was—no sun light, no clock in her room. Well it felt like early morning; but of course in this household of nocturnal people maybe that was just early evening. Weren't ninjas supposed to be night people anyway, all that shadow assassin business… She was positive she heard faint footfalls in the living room. Curiosity got the better of her, and it wasn't as if she could go back to sleeping after waking up anyway.

Peeking out, she caught a glimpse of Splinter entering his own room from a trip to who-knows-where. Silently she went down the ladder to the main floor and trailed over to the turquoise, Japanese sliding doors, careful not to slip on any of Mikey's comics that he had forgotten to bring back to his room or kick the random soda can someone had forgotten to throw away. She didn't want to disturb anyone, especially not Leo.

Little did she know how keen his senses were—nothing snuck past him, even in his sleep. But he didn't reveal himself.

Nothing snuck past Master Splinter either. "Come in, Miss Uranusu."

She jumped again, then winced. She had to stop doing that. So what if a whispery voice from behind closed doors had killed the dark silence?

Not knowing what else to do, she slowly slid the doors open just a tiny bit, "S-sorry to disturb you, sir."

"Please sit down."

With pitiful face she looked around the room before entering and kneeling. Looking anywhere but Splinter's eyes.

He noticed she did that a lot. Rarely did she meet and hold anyone's gaze.

"Something troubles you?"

"…No, Master Splinter."

He noticed her hesitation, as if she had been debating to tell him the truth or not.

"You did not get the chance to continue your story earlier." He started, hoping to get her to open up and get a better grasp of her character.

"It is of no importance, sir." She dodged, "The past means nothing; doesn't matter." She didn't believe what she had just said, and he could tell.

He merely sighed. Perhaps it was too soon to expect her to put confidence in him. It was apparent that whatever had happened to her, she had tried to block it by convincing herself that it was 'of no importance.' "I am always ready to listen, Miss Uranusu."

She bowed, "That is most gracious, Master Splinter." Then she did look at him, and he was able to pick up on the emotions repressed behind the casual tone.

"I never meant to disturb you." She stood and turned, quickly ending their stare as if it had hurt her, "Excuse me, sir." She murmured, retreating from his room and silently sliding the doors shut once more.

* * *

Leo was aware of her presence without even opening his eyes.

Since he had woken up he had decided to put the extra hours to good use.

After all, Master Splinter was right. They were getting too sloppy in their work. Their battles were being won more by sheer dumb luck than skill. Too many things were slipping. More bad guys had escaped; frequently only half of an operation was stopped; more innocents wound up hurt; and more times they had been nearly spotted by the ordinary Joe. It seemed as if everything was winding down. And it was only going to get worse.

It was his responsibility. If his brothers were failing, he was at fault. He was letting them down, both in training them and being a personal example. The recent battles were a reflection of that.

He would intensify their training, starting with his own. If he were to be a true leader, then he would have to bear the severest of discipline.

She didn't say anything, respectful of the deep silence of his meditation. Again, one could say curiosity got the better of her. He sensed rather than heard her moving closer, kneeling not too far in front of him, imitating his stance with the same unfeigned solemnity…that he had had so many years before as a child imitating Splinter's actions. It made him want to smile.

…

6:30.

Leo stood, signaling the end of his meditation period with a few good stretches. Now that he had finished training his mind he was ready to train his body. Ura merely watched as he withdrew his blades and began his katas. She had actually been sitting there the whole time, and he had hardly noticed for her silence and stillness. The only sound that had been heard was that of the two of them breathing.

"Ninjitsu, huh?" It wasn't so much a question as a conversation starter. Sorta like 'Nice weather today, huh?'

"Yeah…"

Klunk, who in typical cat fashion didn't understand the practical sleeping timetable and had just woken up at whatever hour and slipped out of Mikey's room, mewed.

"So what technique of martial arts do you practice?" Leo offered.

Ura looked down, almost guiltily, petting Klunk as if to seem preoccupied, "None…I wish you guys could teach me to fight with skill and finesse instead of just brute force…but I'm not a good learner. Someone else had tried to teach me at one time…My fighting is purely instinctual. I can never get myself out of that sort of mindset." She rubbed her face against the purring Klunk, "Even now, meditating…I couldn't really concentrate on anything, or empty my mind, or, or whatever you're _supposed_ to do while meditating." She laughed lightly and cynically at herself.

"You had me fooled."

"Yeah. I was just sitting still and quiet…for all I know I probably fell asleep."

"Don't worry, happens to Mikey all the time. Listen, Ura. I might not be able to teach you, but I'm sure Master Splinter can help you. It all starts with you wanting to learn and believing that you can."

Ura huffed, which, quite frankly, caught Leo off guard. And if she had stopped to listen to herself, it would have caught her off guard too, "Sorry. I'm also a pessimist…" She did manage to stop herself before adding anything more. "I…can't learn. No matter how much I want to." Though she had told herself it was the end of the discussion, she was surprised to find herself continuing to talk, "Whenever I go into battle, everything I thought I knew flies out the window." Putting Klunk down and standing, she began to imitate the very last kata Leo had been doing a few minutes earlier--not perfectly, but not badly either, "I could mimic you. I could even memorize the deep wisdom of the arts and recite it back to you. But in battle…nothing…applies."

She stopped and put a hand to her head tiredly, "I'm sorry. I'm talking too much. I didn't mean to come in here and bother you."

Leo reached out and grabbed her arm even as she was about to turn and leave, "No, Ura." Was all he could manage to say, think to say. And he found it was all he needed to say.

That shame and discomfort began to melt away again and she quite noticeably let out a breath. She shook her head, "I _am_ sorry for spouting on you. Forget I said anything—it doesn't matter."

"No, I'm glad that you talked to me."

She bowed, the last vestiges of disgrace now faded. "Well, Leo? Continue your training—maybe I _could_ learn a thing or two."

* * *

"Hey Ura! Wanna play Eighth Tracking with me?" Mikey hollered from his seat on the couch, waving the free controller.

Don had been the next to wake up at eight, and he had pretty much grabbed some coffee and immediately taken his seat amongst his bright screens and hard drives, cheerily/sleepily voicing his good-mornings to Leo, Ura, and Splinter. Raph woke up sometime between late nine and early ten and had slunk off to the dojo. About a half hour later, with the music of kiais, punches and kicks thudding against the heavy fabric of a practice dummy, sporadic clicking, and fingers flying lightly over keys, Mikey also appeared. His first stop had been the kitchen, from which the savory smells of bacon shortly began to flow. After breakfast all together—he had firmly plopped himself in front of the entertainment center.

(Actually however, it was not morning but night—the clock read 'p.m.'. But even without the sunlight, it just felt more natural to Ura to pretend it was daytime. It must have been the jet lag that allowed her to fall into place with their cycle.)

Ura merely leaned over the edge of the couch, momentarily looking from Mikey to the screen. "No thanks." Ura was not at all fond of the idea but kept her sentiments to herself, knowing full well that if she watched and—forbid!—was forced to play the game she would regret it. She wasn't one for horror flicks. Real life was difficult enough at times without exciting the imagination to hideously illogical situations and creatures: walking, hungry dead, moving balls of poisonous slime, giant insects—all ridiculous things that persisted to torment one's imagination to frightful dreams. "I'm still not done with...my training session."

"Aw, c'mon, Ura. Life isn't all seriousness and battling! Let's relax!"

"I'd prefer not to."

Mikey gave her his most pitiful face, "Please I'm tired of playing with Raph all the time—he pummels me when I do better than him."

"Don'tcha worry, Mike." Musashi again pretty much suddenly appeared and plopped herself down beside him, snatching a controller. "I am here."

Karen bit back her tongue and instead offered her formal greetings as the turtles and Splinter, one by one, gathered to welcome the three.

"Kojirou and I studied long and hard and came up with some troubling news." Karen started, "We've found out some of the 'joint projects' the Dan and the Foot are up to, thanks to that unauthorized recon."


	15. Chp 14: Of Pretty Experiments

**Chapter 14: Of Pretty Experiments**

"Why?!" Warui cried dramatically to herself. No one else was in the room, at least no one conscious.

She couldn't help but scowl. Looks like someone had heard her complaint against ugly experiments. These were very pretty, if not mindless.

The room was filled with test tubes, and the test tubes were filled with people—no, sprites. Bio-engineered sprites of all types. "This…is an insult." She spouted to nobody, sitting down on the table comfortably. "These people have no idea of how this stuff is supposed to work. Members shouldn't be just mindless copies. An organization ought to have faithful followers, handpicked, and trained in fealty from an early age." She huffed, "The least of my minions could defeat this poor, innocent horde."

She snatched a file from a downed scientist, "So. This is the Dan's contribution. Yeah, I figured that. Sakaki already has scientists creating sprites for pawns at home. Big change there(!)" She carelessly flipped the files over her shoulder to clatter loudly on the ground, "What I wanna know is why they're doing this for the Foot. What are they getting in exchange? …I'll find out. Tee-hee! Crashing labs, fighting goons—This is fun! I miss working the field."

"Speaking of handpicked followers…" She looked down at another knocked-out scientist, "You were pretty good for a Dan'in. Average skills, and above average intellect. Maybe I could work with you."

* * *

"So that person you bumped into was an experiment of the Dan. She was an ice sprite with random numbers and letters for a name, "born" five months ago. We gave her the name Yukina Junsui. We had stumbled across her once and taken pity, befriended her. She would have been our inside source when we got here…but…" Karen sighed sadly, "It appears they found out about her affiliation with us." She looked around and picked up that Don wanted a better explanation.

"How long has the Rocket Gang been doing this… recreating life? And what exactly is the intelligence level of these sprites?"

"Yukina was one of the first batch. Those started with the intelligence of children; they had to learn everything, in a very short time under very impatient bosses I might add. But they were fully sentient—just like normal sprites. They had consciences that had to be numbed, minds put to sleep to any thoughts save following orders. In other words, they were children, locked in adult bodies in a harsh world of missions and punishments. Sakaki wasn't pleased at all with those: thought them inferior, took too much time, too great a probability of them rebelling. Yukina was one of the last ones left. The newer models are supposedly born ready to fight for their boss and have no qualms about it."

"The Dan went too far this time!" Musashi snarled, perhaps feeling the insult that her kind should be used as puppets.

"That's not all. It's what the Foot is giving them in exchange for their elemental army that worries me more. We didn't get much info on that…but it was some sort of formula, probably for biological warfare."

"Then what are we sitting around here for?!"

"We know where their base is! Let's go bust some heads!"

Musashi and Raph grinned at each other.

Karen looked around at them again, sitting back and holding up her hands, "That's another problem, guys. When Kojirou 'scanned' for presence readings that facility was mostly empty—they've transferred. We haven't been able to find them since, but Kojirou will let us know when he finds something." She said, trying to have a lighter tone, patting him on the shoulder.

"Anyways, enough with the doom and gloom. What have you guys been up to? And how did you enjoy your little sleepover, Ura?"

Before anyone could say anything, other voices intruded the lair. "Hi guys!"

Unable to fight pure instinctual shyness, Ura withdrew as two humans strolled into view.

"Karen," Donatello started, motioning to them, "Meet April O'Neil and Casey Jones."

Ura remained hiding, Musashi was her normal rude self, and Kojirou was subtly skeptic. "Pleasure to meet you," Karen said formally offering a handshake, "I was unaware the turtles had other affiliates."

"As was I." Said April, "Just today we were told that the guys had made some new friends."

Karen couldn't help but break from formality and grin a bit, especially at Casey staring dumbly at her wings, "You know my name, and this is Kojirou, Musashi, and…and the last member of our party is around here somewhere…"

Casey looked them over: from the angel, to the tips of cat ears sticking out from behind a pillar, to the calmly-expressioned floating purple-haired guy, to the red-head standing there in an I'm-too-cool-for-you look and a smirk on her face, "Uh, so, you guys don't exactly look like you're from around here…"

"Duh." Musashi started.


	16. Chp 15: Playing Games

**Chapter 15: Of Playing Games**

Things had not gone as well as planned. Oroku Saki let out a guttural growl, shoving the injured scientist off his feet and motioning for Hun to punish him for his failures. Not only had someone broken into the laboratory, but important files had gone missing, expensive, irreplaceable technology was ruined, and the new sprite division had all mysteriously died within hours of their supposed birth. "This was a complete failure! Get Sakaki Oda on the line this instant!"

"If I may be so bold," Started a psychic sprite in a callous and unmoved voice. He was the sole Rocket executive present at the time, not that he seemed worried to be outnumbered and in the presence of a very mad Oroku Saki. "Our half of the deal was sound. We made no errors in our calculation. If you are looking to place the blame on someone, look to your own Foot who were supposed to be guarding our facility."

"You watch your tongue Basho Ohbari! I did not make this deal to match wits with you."

The executive merely narrowed his ice blue eyes.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. Dissension in the ranks? How immature!" Said a peppy, young voice.

Basho's eyes widened slightly, inwardly panicking as he recognized the voice. He teleported away a second later.

Oroku Saki didn't notice, "Who dares?!" He snarled, as he and the Foot present looked every which way for the intruder.

"I expected so much more from you, the infamous Shredder." A low, sultry voice purred, "I thought you might actually be worth playing with." Out of nowhere stepped Warui—well, it looked like Warui…if she had had a sudden and dramatic maturity and growth spurt. She had gone from age fifteen to twenty-five, from cute and happy to voluptuous and deathly serious. She was the splitting image of Karen, only with red eyes. "I was the one who wrecked your little lab."

"Seize her!"

"How dull." Without much effort at all she knocked the attacking Foot off their feet with her black wings. "Saki." She closed the distance between him and her, catching his bladed gauntlet before he slashed her, "I want to play."


	17. Chp 16: Movement Forward

**Chapter 16: Movement Forward**

Karen's pen tapped the worn pad restlessly. The condition of the journal as an ironic contrast with her usual orderly character and way of life. It was battered with running ink, white-outs, torn edges, blots, ripped out pages, and frantic scratch outs. Even her handwriting with its rushed carryout was only twenty-percent of its usual neatness. Musashi would probably never have believed that it belonged to her.

She looked out the window from her bed at the busy scene below. She had not been totally unused to city life. After all, Kanto, Nomékop had its fair share of great cities: Crimson, Celadon, Darvershire, Saffron… Still, she hadn't exactly stayed in one for such an extended period of time. It was strange to see hordes of people, running all over the place with amazing grumpiness and haste. Reminiscent of Musashi. Lots of strange ones too, not that she had the right to talk.

She took her pen to the pad again. _Ura's mood seems to improve markedly and progressively. Her new friends bring out the best in her. Smiling comes easier, and Michelangelo even gets her to laugh. I never knew she had such a pretty laugh. She also came out of hiding the last time April and Casey came down. Splinter endeavours to teach her some basic martial arts (not so much ninjitsu as mind and body connection and graceful, controlled movements) and she endeavours to learn. Truly, she does have a hard time __when it comes to the actual test-what-you-learned time__—but one thing she is is determined and stubborn. Leonardo gives her pointers as well, though, generally speaking, all the turtles try to stay out of it. Something about them not being good teachers from some past experience and not wanting to confuse her. She has taken up residence in their lair, staying in a spare room. This arrangement appears to be good for both her and for them: they get someone new to torture, as Raphael puts it, and she gets to add some people to her very short list of friendly acquaintances. Besides all this, she gets to put her compulsive cleaning habits to good work, no matter how much Splinter tells her it's the boys' duty. Even with this relatively short period of time, she views Splinter as a father-figure. It'll do her good. Whenever he ventures out of his room, she usually takes a station near to him. Who would have thought that a feline and a rodent could get along so well? And she always gets up early to be with Leonardo in the dojo—Ura finally has a companion for all that crazy training stuff. I mean, I've heard about exercise, but Ura's typical routine includes running for five miles and doing two hundred on the chin-up bar, and that's just the warm up. If she had it her way she'd be exercising eight hours a night and cleaning the other six hours. At least Leonardo will see that she does not kill herself. She conducts 'junk runs' with Don whenever he needs some extra hands. She's even broken down and agreed to play video games from time to time with Michelangelo, though never long enough for his tastes. She'd rather be working out or scrubbing the floor. She is all too happy to help the guys out or make their lives more enjoyable. After all, it isn't as if they're living in the lap of luxury. _Karen smiled to herself before continuing, _How she manages to get away with crawling down manholes carrying groceries and some common amenities that she could afford and they didn't have, I'll never know._

Approximately seven weeks had passed since they had first met the turtles and their rat master. Kojirou hadn't been able to locate the new headquarters of the Dan. However, fortunately, there were no reports thus far of their rogue ventures. Karen merely believed that it was the deep breath before the plunge, the quiet before the storm.

_Musashi._ Karen paused again and looked out the window for a while, _Musashi's been Musashi. She doesn't understand or try to understand Donatello and frequently pokes fun at Splinter and Leonardo behind their backs. It is her relationship with Raphael that keeps my mind reeling. It must be a tough-person thing. They always bicker, and yet, ask either one of them and they'd act like they're best buds. Those two are nothing but trouble, especially when Casey joins their little party. Musashi goes absolutely berserk should either of those two utter some sexist statement and before you know it something smells burnt. On the other hand, say some scenario occurs and then you see a grin start to form on one of them, spreading over their face, making them look like some evil dark sprite, and then the other one catches on, so you have two scary-smirkers and before you know it, things get messy for some unfortunate person. Partners in crime. And then there's always the teasing, name-calling, shoulder-punching, and general wrestling on the ground. She gets along great with Michelangelo—those two are all chum-chummy, though she does tease him about his comic-obsession. Whenever Koji teleports us down there, she pretty much immediately goes to hang with him._

_Me? I guess you can say I really find Leonardo's grit and dedication admirable. It's clear his brothers look up to him in their own subtle ways. I can tell he is one who would fight to the death to protect his family. Give all there was and then some. I just hope I could be like him when the time comes. He's a marvel. And the way he just accepts being the responsible one, without a thank you or a break. He's always working so hard. I rather wish Michelangelo would grow up, but at the same time, he does produce a general cheery atmosphere. His happy-go-lucky-ness is both endearing and annoying at the same time. At times he surprises me __with a sudden spurt of seriousness or smartness. Underestimated…__ He's a sensitive kid with a good heart and his __brothers' __definitely need him. I have to admit, Raphael can scare me. I would not want to get on his bad side. At least I can be pretty sure what to expect from Musashi as I know her, but I can't always be positive with him. Well, I can assume he wouldn't hurt me, and I'm pretty sure he'd jump to my defense if something bad happened to me. He is vehemently protective of his brothers when it comes to life and death situations. I guess he and I are just complete opposites. Everything I do grates on his nerves and I cannot condone his behaviour. Donnie's amazing._ She grinned like a silly school girl and felt like one too, _I really don't know what else to say. I just love his quiet and industrious nature, his voice, the look he gets on his face when he's thinking about something. Not to mention, I finally have someone to have an intelligent conversation with. Though his role is more passive, he is undoubtedly important to his family. It's more than all his convenient, economical, technological toys too—he's able to best keep everyone together, especially when Raphael and Leonardo are mad at each other, and Michelangelo only makes things worst. I really…_ She trailed off, staring at the journal, _I really like him a lot. I don't know what I feel. I'm torn. I want to be loyal to Koji—I mean, we never made any promises, but it would still break his heart (especially after Musashi) and I just don't know about the possible repercussions trying to get closer to Donnie. Though so alike, our worlds are so far apart. I mean, I don't even know what I feel! Friendship or infatuation? Romantic love or the love of a sister for a brother… All I know is that …I just feel happy being with him. _She sighed, rubbing her temples. It was so complicated.

_Much to my disappointment, Koji hasn't gotten out of whatever funk he's in. He's still despondent and aloof. It's like he's a totally different person. I can only imagine what his problem is. He barely says hello and goodbye to the guys._

"Could we go now?" Musashi asked with annoyed tone and hands on her hips, standing in the doorway.

Before she could reply, Kojirou also appeared, "There's a problem. I can sense it."

Just then, the shell cell rang.


	18. Chp 17: A Fable

**Chapter 17: A Fable**

"They're a team right, a family? No matter why you haven't been able to defeat them before. Well then it's time you apply the most basic of strategies against them, sir.

"Since you seem so fond of animals and symbols, sir, (calling your enemies turtles and all) I think it is suitable you heard this tale: 'Three bulls were grazing in a meadow, and were watched by a lion, who longed to capture and devour them, but who felt that he was no match for the three so long as they kept together. So he began by false whispers and malicious hints to foment jealousies and distrust among them. This stratagem succeeded so well that ere long the bulls grew cold and unfriendly, and finally avoided each other and fed each one himself apart. No sooner did the lion see this than he fell upon them one by one and killed them in turn.'

"Of course, you mustn't reveal your hand. If they realize it is you who caused them to suffer dissension, they will be reunited with hatred and anger for you tenfold."

"And? I am hearing answers that raise more questions!" Shredder exclaimed, impatient with her round about way of telling things, indignant that this _child_ should act like she knew more than he did, and infuriated that he hadn't been able to overcome her. To think that he hadn't been able to kill _her,_who seemed so careless and distracted! He couldn't even tell if she honestly was that whimsy or it was all an elaborate act. There she was: thrusting herself into _his_ domain and acting like his equal instead of his inferior! Making him look like a _fool_! It made his blood boil all over again. Her one redeeming point was that she promised (at a strange price _not _of money) to offer her skills against his enemies and getting rid of those annoying freaks was first on his list. After he conquered the utrom homeworld and came back to earth in glory, THEN she'd learn her place. "How soon can you put this plan into action?!"

She merely looked at him, "These things take time: months, at _least_, not hours at most.

"Use their different personalities against them—they _do_ have different personalities? Unless they are all robots…Is that it? Are they robot turtle things? No that couldn't be it. Robots have no emotion and therefore no incentive—you would have beaten them by now. So, capitalize their differences and make the split in their relations look natural."

"If you are so brilliant a strategist why can you not create and utilize a plan _now_?" He demanded, slamming his fist into the table.

She didn't jump, "Well, one could rush into things and be defeated. Or one could take the time to fully develop a plan, get to know the enemies, come up with contingencies, and possibly win."

He just so wanted to slash into her pretty, condescending face right then and there.


	19. Chp 18: Act I

**Chapter 18: Act I**

"April's missin!" A beat up Casey exclaimed both angry and distraught. "I went to her apartment and found it empty and trashed cept for some punk in black clothes marked with a big red 'R'. He was rummaging through her stuff. I confronted 'im but he wouldn't tell me nothing."

"Why would dan'in kidnap April?" Don put his head in his hands.

"Bait." Karen said simply, taking note of their distress, particularly Don's, "Whatever they're planning, they're setting you guys up for emotional trauma—aiming for your hearts to blind your reasoning." She began to stroke her chin, "That's a very unusual tactic for the dan…usually they have no tactic other than brute force…I wonder if they have acquired a strategist or something."

She continued before Raph could interject, "We can't just go out there 'busting heads', although a more thorough search of her apartment might be in order."

Musashi, who was usually all for action, merely looked at her nails, unmoved by their worry. "Feh…you know I'm not the searching type. I'll stay here." It wasn't as if she had exactly gotten along with the store proprietor anyway.

Karen merely nodded, herself thinking that Musashi was too impatient to bring on such a mission, though she would have been useful if it proved to be a trap. In fact, "Leonardo, Don, Koji, you guys come with me; the rest of you can wait here. If we run into trouble, we'll call you." As she passed Casey, she put a hand on his shoulder, "Don't worry," She started for the door with her fellow investigators "—not because everything will be alright, but because it will not help the situation."

"Gee, thanks for your encouragement." Casey muttered, making a face as Splinter inspected his arm.

After finishing his assessment, Splinter followed Karen, "I too will accompany you, Ms. Sabishii."

"Hey, don't count me out!" Casey also joined the caravan.

Mikey, Raph, Musashi, and Ura stared at each other respectively. Ura probably felt out of place to be left with…the hot\extreme\insensible\passionate\whimsical\extroverted\whatever-you-call-it crazy people… and went off by herself to her room, grabbing Klunk on the way.

Musashi paced, Mikey looked at the ground, and Raph twirled his sai.

"Well." Musashi started, "Kar did say it didn't help to stand around moping…soooo, we might as well not stress ourselves out."

"I guess doin something is better than standin 'ere worryin."

"Yeah."

"I mean, no one would be mad at us. I'm sure your friend is alive and happy right now."

"We'll find her—we'll go out to save 'er once teh others get back."

"Yeah, so…" Mikey looked up.

Musashi not so subtly turned on the radio she happened to be standing in front of. "Let's…pass the time."

Ura merely stuck her head out, ears pressed against her head irately. Some loud rock, rap, or whatever had started pumping from the stereo, vibrating the ground, and generally making her feel as though she'd get a panic attack. Mikey had taken to skateboarding; Raph was just setting down some beer for himself while Musashi was taking a swig of some fire-sprite drink. Ura scowled at the noise and rowdiness that had invaded her calm state of mind for a minute more before withdrawing again, pretending she didn't know those maniacs.

_It's the first time we have the house to ourselves! _Musashi thought gleefully, swigging her hips. She herself was quite happy with the situation—not to sound heartless. She certainly didn't want April to die or anything, even if she wasn't her favorite person. But still, this was excitement; it was what she had been looking for. _Finally, something interesting. Who cares about some stupid investigation? Karen wants to leave me out and I want to be left out. I can party as much as I want now! _She suddenly realized that Mikey had abandoned his skateboard and went to join Ura in her room. She outwardly laughed at the thought of Ura reluctantly putting down her book and agreeing to look through Mikey's comics. He was a goofball, and she loved him for it, especially compared to the little ball of angst and seriousness that Leo was, and the nerdbrain that Donnie was. She also realized that she was alone with Raph. She grinned. _Sweet. _"Hey, ever gone clubbing, Raphie?"

"I told ya not ta call me that…" He muttered but not very angrily, "It'd be a lil hard considerin my circumstances, doncha think? Even if I could slip pass Splin'er Jr., it's not like—"

"Bah, no one would ever notice you—it's the perfect place for a five-foot tall teenage mutant turtle like yourself to get away and have some fun."

"Heh, I wish."

"Fine with me." She took a swig before closing the distance in one step, rubbing herself against him and slipping one arm around his neck, leaning her head down to face his, "I will bring the party to you."

Raph had to admit, though Musashi had always been flirty with him, he had been caught off guard, but quickly recovered from his shock, returning that nasty grin they shared as he slipped both hands around her waist, "Sounds good to me."

Them being the only ones in the room, they didn't just rock back and forth; they melted into each other. As the music continued to pump at liberty, the passionate pace increased. Musashi raised her arms over her head and he slid his hands down her sides. Swaying faster and more seductive, she rubbed hard against his leg and turned so that he was at her back. She tilted her head back, resting it on his shoulder and he ran his fingers over her throat, breathing on her neck.

They danced dirty and wore each other out, dancing through one song and drinking through the next, laughing raucously about nonsensical things. It was a wonder Ura or Mikey didn't poke their heads out. The hard electric guitar and drums echoed off the high ceiling.

Musashi looked back at him and felt his movements controlling hers. They were so close, they were breathing air right out of each other's mouths. Their lips were inches apart.


	20. Chp 19: Unnecessary Explosion

**Chapter 19: An Unnecessary Explosion**

"Raph!" "Musashi!" Both Karen and Leo's voices sounded at the same time.

Musashi abruptly pulled away, fumbling to untangle herself from Raph.

Leo, Don, Karen, Kojirou, and Splinter had returned. And hearing the yelling, Mikey and Ura came out of their hiding spot too to see the spectacle as the respective leaders of the two groups, official or unofficial, gaped in, what looked very much like, horror.

Raph got up soon after Musashi did. Meanwhile the both of them were overly annoyed at being disturbed.

"What?!" Raph snapped.

"What?" Karen gawked, beating Leo to the scolding, "Is that all you have to say for such improprietous behaviour? Rolling around with each other on the couch h-half dressed?"

"It's none of your business what he and I were doing!" Musashi growled as she causally pulled the strap of her dress to where it belonged, face reddening in both embarrassment and anger, "I'm old enough to make my own decisions! And don't you get all self-righteous on me!" Without another word she shoved pass Karen and all of them and exited the lair.

Karen looked around, pretty much at a loss, before going out after her. Kojirou followed.

"Raph, may I speak to you, alone?" Leo started lowly; he looked a lot calmer than Karen.

"No." He retorted, perhaps inspired by Musashi's anger—not that he needed much inspiration in that department, "Anythin you have to say, say it here, like how I'm always bein the thoughtless irresponsible one—"

_I wish I could just walk away and forget that I had seen anything,_ Leo thought.

It was a shame too; they had been getting along very well with less and less arguments. It seemed a thing of the past.

"What's wrong, Leo?" Raph yelled at him. "So what if I was making out with her, huh? I don't see as that's_ any _of your business."

"I never thought you'd…"

"What d'you care, anyways?" Raph cut him off.

He looked away, but said nothing, and Raph felt he suddenly realized what the heart of the problem was. "Ya just can't stand it, can ya?" He demanded, taking a step closer. "You can't stand to think that somethin, _anything_could happen without your explicit permission."

"It was too short a time. You've known her for two months, Raph." Less than that, technically, it's not like they visited everyday, "You know so little about her." Leo reminded him. "The safety of our family and the code of bushido—"

"What difference does that make?" Raph shot back. "And why is it any of your business?" He repeated, "You can't control my life, Leo!"

Leo called something after him... something in Japanese. Raph didn't understand it in his fury. But he knew it was some kind of insult, storming out of the lair faster than he could register the retaliation.

Ura backed away from the scene, feeling depressed. The room just reeked with it, whoever she looked at. She hated it when people—her adopted family—got all mad with each other, yelling and saying things they didn't mean. At least, she better hope they didn't mean it. Words hurt. More than wounds.

She took no sides in the arguments; she never did. Never wanted to make things worse. Well, she always had an opinion on who was right, but she never voiced it. It didn't matter.

She gave Splinter a sad look, "I'm going to get some air, sir."

Leo was next to move, heading to the dojo resolutely. _Although I can never admit it to his face, all I really want is to protect him. But I can't protect him. It's not my place. He's a big boy now, capable of making his own decisions. There is nothing I can do to stop him, even if I know those decisions are wrong. _

Swipe, swipe, parry, swipe.

Getting romantically involved would be…too complicated… Too many differences. The mutation had made them human, but not enough. Honor didn't allow intimacy, and marriage would be as sidetracking to their ninjitsu as it would be practically impossible. Any potential girlfriends of theirs would be in constant danger. They just couldn't have any distractions in their ninja training. And just what did they have to offer the girls anyway? Wasn't like they could give them a traditional marriage and live a normal family life.

It would be utterly selfish to trap the girls in the dark, smelly sewers, force them to live a separate life, just to keep him and his brothers company and make them happy.

Swipe, swipe, parry, swipe.

He was a ninja, and he was a mutated turtle; his life was absorbed in defending his family and using his skills to right some of the wrongs of the world—fighting the Shredder, the Foot, Bishop, and the Purple Dragons…That was his life.

Swipe, swipe, parry, swipe.

He wished he could be like Raph or even Mikey, and let his emotions guide him. But he was the leader, and he had to be the perfect example of self-restraint.

Swipe, swipe, parry, swipe.

He'd never hated his logical and devoted-to-ninjitsu mindset more.

Swipe, swipe, parry, swipe.

_This is the life we _have_ to live._ He thought icily pausing in his basic kata routine, looking down, and letting his arms drop to his side and his grip loosen.

* * *

"Shut up! I'm not playing 20-questions, Karen. I don't have to answer to you or anyone!" She shoved past her and dropped down on her bed.

"I want to know what happened."

"Nothing."

Karen still stood there with her arms crossed.

"Nothing okay!" Musashi snarled, looking up at her. "Even drunk, Raph was too devoted to 'honor' and whatever to do anything like _that_."

Karen turned to leave, exhibiting no emotions, "I want you to apologize for your misconduct at the next most appropriate time."

"I hate you." Musashi seethed, "You're an overbearing, hypocritical tyrant, and I hate you!" She yelled, fists clenched and eyes brimming.

Karen didn't react, but turned and left, quietly closing the door behind her.


	21. Chp 20: Act II

**Chapter 20: Act II**

_The perfect son, the perfect leader, the perfect pain in my butt that reminds me of how imperfect I am._

He went up to the surface, taking care to hide in the shadows. He ran past the bars, past the strip clubs, and Central Park, past the couples who walked arm in arm, laughing happily and kissing.

_I can't stand Leo_! Raph growled to himself, leaping from roof-top to roof-top effortlessly. _He's all high and mighty, just cuz Splinter chose him to be 'leader'. He's a complete control-freak!_

Raph's irrational thoughts were cut short by a girl's screaming. Heading towards the sound he spotted some purple dragons surrounding a teenager with long pink hair, who was sobbing and huddled against the alley wall for dear life.

He drew his sai, eyes narrowing dangerously, "These punks chose the wrong night…" Without any more hesitation, he dove down and attacked.

One ran at him with a chain. Raph flicked the sai, tangling the weapon around it and yanking it away. Then, spinning the sai in his other fist, he used the blunted handle to hit the bridge of his nose, hearing a satisfying crack. The next second, there were two men swinging at him. He dropped at the last moment, not having time to think his attack through, and swept his leg across the ground, expecting to just make them jump back and give him some room to think. Instead, it knocked them both off their feet. Pathetic.

Raph stepped back, not even breathing hard yet.

When the last dragon was down, he turned to the girl. Raquel merely screamed again, something about lizard freaks, before running out into civilization, crying that she'd seen a monster.

Raph's shoulders slumped at the thanks, but he felt a tad better after the fight. As if nothing had happened or as if it was some distant dream. As if he'd overreacted or blamed the wrong person for the wrong thing. _Eh, maybe I should head back now_… Didn't mean he was going to go groveling, or even had to talk to anyone. It was getting too cold to brood outside anyway.

He halted, sensing something. Looking up, he saw the skyline of the buildings above him, filled with Foot ninja.


	22. Chp 21: Realization of Wrongness

**Chapter 21: A Realization of Wrongness**

Silence reigned. And so did anxiety.

Kojirou knew he ought to be taking advantage of this opportunity to continue his mental scan for April's physical and emotional activity and pinpoint her whereabouts, but the tenseness hindered him from concentrating. And it wasn't as if the gifts of the psychic came without price. He stood from the couch, almost dizzying himself, and walked to the kitchen, getting himself a glass and some painkillers for his headache. For a moment, he stared at the glass then the faucet. He shook his head and 'summoned' his own water to fill the cup. He smiled at that—just because his primary element wasn't 100 percent didn't mean his secondary one was off limits.

He'd always preferred to drink his own water anyway.

He heard the phone ringing and went to pick it up, only to realize it wasn't the phone, per say, but the shell cell. _Man, even my normal senses are whacked_. Had to remember not to try to use his powers continuously for twelve hours…

"Yes? Oh, hi Donnie." He heard Karen's muted voice from the living room and had to swallow back the strange jealousy that arose whenever he heard the turtle's name. He shook his head (only to wince at the pain it caused him). He couldn't possibly be in competition with him. Karen didn't seriously like Donatello…not _like_ like… it just couldn't be.

"What?!…Of course—we'll be there immediately."

Karen came in the kitchen a second later, "Um, Koji, Raphael didn't return last night. And neither did Ura." She continued talking hurriedly, wringing her hands, "However she did manage to send them a signal on the shell cell—but they haven't heard from her since, and can't contact her or Raphael, and since then their scans have been pretty much stationary, meaning---"

Kojirou nodded, understanding, then nodded towards Musashi's room.

Karen looked at him rather pleadingly, "Would you? You know she wouldn't answer to me for anything. She's still sulking. I-I'll be downstairs waiting." And she took off.

Kojirou sighed then marched as resolutely as he could towards Musashi's door, "Musha, it's me—"

"Leave me alone!"

"Not an option." He mentally gulped; Musashi'd only known him as an easy going guy—he'd never told her what to do, in fact he hardly talked with her at all since she broke up with him (though he knew he shouldn't be bitter; they were complete opposites in more than just element and it would never have worked out). But right now he was trying his best to sound like Karen, "There's trouble and we need you. Now."

It worked. If nothing else, it got her mad enough to open the door and more or less chase him out of the hotel.


	23. Chp 22: Turning the Tide

**Chapter 22: Turning the Tide**

Why was she here?

She remembered how she got there. But she didn't know _why_ she was there, instead of just, say, dead.

She'd stumbled across Raphael, fighting purple dragons in an alley to protect some pink-haired lady. She hadn't jumped in then. He didn't need her help then, and she figured it was better to let him work all that rage out of his system. She had only jumped in once the Foot arrived.

Ura hadn't been able to cut through to him right away, and she hadn't even been aware whether or not he had known she was there. But…

She squeezed her eyes shut and let her head drop. She had let everyone down.

The Foot had been somewhat more difficult that time around. And by the time she had cleared a path to Raph—she'd frozen up when she saw they had knocked him unconscious and were posed to drive their swords into him. She had had no choice.

"Hands up! If you want this abomination to live—" Snarled one of the Rocket dan'in mixed in with the Foot. It seemed the ninjas themselves never uttered a word.

Inwardly flinching she immediately did as told, too afraid to think but trying to hide it. Afraid and enraged. How had she let them do that to him? She had been the last standing—his life depended on her, and she'd completely screwed up. She still stood, numb and frozen as they had taken her weapons away.

"Not so tough now eh?" Another dan'in jeered nastily as a Foot member bound her arms behind her back. They had kneed her in the stomach and punched her in the face before throwing her to the ground.

When they weren't looking, when they were busy tying up Raph, she'd managed to wriggle around and press the auto-dial on her shell cell. That was about her only action she had been satisfied with. Next thing she knew, they had smashed her head through a car window.

If…if she had been anyone else, she was sure they would have been able to think of something. Anything other than surrender. Karen—she was always coming up with the plans. But she'd been too stupid, too panicky to think. And now. Now she had no idea where she was, or where Raph was.

Great. All that to avoid getting Raph killed and they probably killed him anyway, or were torturing him, or dissecting him.

Her wrists were raw and bloody from her struggling against the chains. And she'd been beaten and bruised all over, and left in nothing but her underwear. She just found it a wonder she had even that, especially based on her history.

That very same guy who she beat before—Hun—and some Rocket executive with ice blue hair and matching eyes came in the room. The instant she heard them coming she ducked her head down and stared solidly at the floor.

"Well, hello, little kitty." Hun said snidely, "Remember me?"

If he was expecting an answer, he would have been sorely disappointed. She didn't say anything, and for all her reaction, her hearing might also have been held in question.

"Seems freaks are just popping up all over the place. Where are you from? Why have you affiliated with those reptilian rejects? Who taught you?"

Nothing.

She didn't even flinch when he punched the wall beside her head, making it crack. She had experience in this sort of thing anyway. "Arrogant wench! You don't even know who you're dealing with! In joining those turtle freaks, you've sealed your fate. You'll be taken to the lab, by order of Master Shredder. But not before you and I get a little better acquainted."

From where it hung, her hand twitched. And the chain rattled.

"By the time I'm done here, your pathetic turtle friend will already have been dismembered—"

Ura looked up, turned her head towards his arm still leaning on the wall, and bit him. Eyes narrowed into slits as she tore through his flesh with the ferocity of a rabid animal, with him yelling in shock and pain all the while. Suddenly she whimpered and let go, feeling a sudden sharp pain in her head.

Basho stopped glowing and surveyed Hun with less than sympathetic eyes, "Incompetent fool." He muttered before healing the wound partially; then he turned and left.

Hun also turned and left in a great rage, but not before calling her something not so nice and slamming his fist into her face.

Once they were gone she let out a breath and tested her jaw, amazed that nothing was broken. She made a disgusted face, spitting out blood. That was certainly a drawback when she bit someone. And it had just combined with her own blood from a busted lip. _That_ part didn't bother her too much.

_That's enough_. She thought, narrowing her eyes. _Even if I was a total let down to Raph before…I'm not just going to stand around here and continue to be worthless._

The manacles were actually loose enough—they had been designed for someone with larger wrists and ankles…so…

She took a few breaths before tearing one arm free. It hurt, and she had to wait a moment before essentially taking the skin off her other hand. She swore she saw a bit of white under the raw red and rapidly increasing blood flow, but she didn't look for long. It just made it hurt worst.

_Just like old days._ She thought darkly.

* * *

"Raph!" Two voices cried. 

Musashi and Leo stared at each other for a second, before dashing down the hall as if in a race. Musashi was literally on fire, blasting the Foot with scorching heat besides slashing into them unmercifully. Leo figured she had them under control and cut Raph free from the stretcher they had him tied down to.

"Are you okay?" Don questioned as he sat up groggily, hoping they hadn't arrived too late.

"Raphie! We were so worried!" Mikey added.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm just…" He winced as he stood, nearly losing his balance, "Peachy."

Musashi had just finished destroying a good portion of equipment in the lab and finished off hurling one of her blades at a camera she spotted. Satisfied, she retrieved her weapon, sheathed them both, and walked over to Raph, "Good to see ya." She greeted nonchalantly, as if they had met in the park on a sunny day.

Karen and Kojirou merely looked at each other quizzically.

Musashi looked him over, subtly, scowling at all the bruises and scars. When she was done, she kicked one of the fallen Foot…and slammed her fist into another table…and—

"Raphael." Karen started, stepping forward hesitantly, not forgetting the argument from yesterday so easily and afraid he'd be mad at her too, "Do you have any idea where Ura is?"

He looked down, "Oh great." He muttered.

"We got here by tracking the shell cell signal—but it just led us to a storage room where we found two, as well as your sai" Leo took them out of Don's duffle bag and handed them to him, "and her sword and bow…" Karen trailed off, "You don't know…do you?"

"All I know is that…" His eyes widened as he trailed off, thinking. Yeah, she had come to his aid, hadn't she? He'd gotten himself in a big mess and now… "I'm not gonna just stand aroun here and mope about it." He stepped forward trying to hide his pain, "C'mon!"

Karen nudged Kojirou, who looked a little upset before concentrating on Raph. The red banded terrapin was undoubtedly surprised to find his hurts hurting less. Kojirou could only take so much and had to stop, falling to one knee.

Raph just raised an eye-ridge.

Kojirou got up and dusted himself off, "You're welcome." He trudged off crankily. It hurt to heal someone after all. Healing didn't come cheap, and the healer had to experience twice the pain of the actually injury itself in order to heal it.

_Well_. Kojirou thought, grimacing as another headache started to come on, _That ought to earn me some points with Karen_.


	24. Chp 23: Counterattack

**Chapter 23: Counterattack**

The unbelievable convenience of the situation was not lost on Ura. She'd managed to find April.

April had gotten off much easier, Ura thought. She was only locked in a cage without chains and with all her clothes, but she had been nonetheless quite fearful and despondent, tossing and turning, with her hair a mess and face dirtied by tears. Even if she was in a better condition than Ura had been, Ura didn't think anything of her reaction. After all, April probably wasn't used to these sorts of situations like she was. Ura noiselessly brought her bloodied hands to the lock and picked at it with her claws. Then she darted in and woke the woman up.

"Ura? What-Where?"

Ura merely put a finger to her lips, ears pressed back, and then motioned for April to follow her. Slowly she got to her knees, but when she tried to stand, she tottered. Ura caught hold of April and slipped her arm over her own shoulder to support her. "M-my ankle. I sprained it."

Ura knew it couldn't be _that_ convenient. Now what? The most ideal thing would be to leave April somewhere safe and go by herself to find Raph. But Ura didn't trust anything around there and wasn't about to leave someone. So…this would hinder her progress exponentially…and jeopardize her mission. But she deemed it the only thing she could do as she looked at April's determined but pain-filled face.

Man, that brought back memories.

She'd seen that look, so many times before.

Suddenly Ura caught a scent in the air and brightened visibly. "Everyone's here April. They're looking for you." Even as she said that she saw Raph running into view.

She felt unbelievably relieved. He was fine. April'd been found. And the others were all here too…

Now, all they had to do was escape and maybe they'd throw a party afterwards.

"Humph, the audacity!" Said some Rocket executive lady with long green hair.

"Well, well, well, isn't this sweet?" Said Hun.

Before they even greeted each other…

As one they all turned and saw the Foot, Hun, Basho, and some Dan'in entering the room through the other way. They were soon surrounded, and the doors were barred.

_Of course it wouldn't be that easy. No, no chance to breathe or say 'hello, good to see you.'_

Leo gritted his teeth withdrawing his weapons and looking to Don who withdrew his own weapon before standing in front of April and Ura; Mikey gulped; Musashi and Raph collectively looked happy and eager. Their enemies were on them in seconds.

"I can fight!" Ura cried, looking to Leo, hating to feel useless—worse than useless—to feel like baggage, extra weight, a burden. She slashed at the face of a Foot that had snuck past Don's defenses, then grounded him with a roundhouse kick.

She was a berserker at heart. She wanted to get out there, like Musashi, like all of them. Fight for honor and love and all that stuff. She was weaponless and injured but that didn't mean she was worthless…at least, she hoped it didn't. It didn't have to.

Leo didn't say anything, though the look in his eyes spoke volumes. She turned in a split second and slammed her fist into the stomach of a dan'in that had been about to hurt April, wincing only slightly at the impact on her bloody wrist. She understood.

He_ knew_ she could fight. This wasn't a punishment. If he knew, if he didn't think she was worthless…then that was all that mattered. She resigned herself to keeping an eye on April.

"Now isn't a good time for this." Karen shouted to Leo, even as she parried blade with blade. They had three wounded on their hands, not enough supplies, no idea what they were up against, no plan—

"No way we're leaving!" Raph growled. This was the opportunity they'd been waiting for. They couldn't waste time retreating. They ought to take them all out right there, right then, and eliminate the threat to their safety.

Leo saw both sides and felt torn.

To stay and get it all over with then would be the most convenient, the most ideal. But it was dangerous: they were way outnumbered and Ura was probably bleeding to death.

He wouldn't risk the health of his family and friends for anything.

He glanced to Karen, who in turn yelled to Kojirou. The psychic took the queue and in an instant they were all gone.

"Curses!" Francine Banks growled, clenching her fists even as she broke through to where they last stood, "Basho is there any way for you to follow his psychic, glowy trail or whatever it is?"

"Mental energy path." Basho corrected her with an annoyed tone. "Due to a certain earlier incident—" He glared at Hun, "I'm extraordinarily low on power."

"Hey! I could do it!" Said a young, peppy voice.

* * *

"Grrr You let them escape!" Raph glared at Karen and Kojirou.

"Not now Raph." Leo said firmly. Fortunately, Raph decided to let it go as the pain started to kick in.

Don had returned by now with bandages and Splinter. He came to Ura first, since she looked the worst with dried blood down her arms, but she merely held out her hand and shook her head, "It's nothing. Raph…and April first… I'll wait."

By now he knew it was senseless to argue with her and hurried over to April, whom the others were helping move to the couch while Karen decided to call Casey and put his mind at ease.

Ura turned tiredly, unnoticed, and started walking towards her room. Not completely unnoticed. Just as she thought she was about to pass out, someone picked her up and carried her the rest of the way.

"Thanks Leo…"


	25. Chp 24: Apologizing

**Chapter 24: Apologizing**

"Here."

"What do you expect me to do with this?" Musashi asked Don quizzically, holding the swabs and bottle filled with an unknown, clear, sharp-smelling liquid oddly as if they were going to attack her.

"I could use some help here." He muttered, going back to the groaning April, "And you look bored."

"I'm no doctor!" She protested, "Why don't you get Karen or someone to do it?"

"I wasn't always a 'doctor' either. In fact I only took to studying medicine recently—because I want to be able to help my brothers in anyway possible."

"That's nice."

He sighed, "Just disinfect his cuts, wrap up anything that's bleeding, securely, but not too tight…I'll be around to check him out later. And I think it would be safest sending you as I get the impression he's not too happy right now with Karen or Kojirou…"

Musashi shrugged, "Whatever." She grinned and darted for Raph's room. "Hey, Raphie!" She called cheerily, barging in.

"Haven't you eva mastered the secret art of knockin?" He growled. He had to admit it felt rather awkward being alone with her in a room after what had happened the night before. She didn't seem uncomfortable in the least however.

"Oooh, your little hurts making you cranky? It's not like there's anything to knock on anyway." She responded not the least bit perturbed. "Well, you better be nice to me." She threatened, grabbing his arm and waving the swab dangerously, "I have to sterilize you."

"You can be a real Mikey, ya know, Musha."

"Hey! That's not fair." She whined, purposely rubbing a little too hard as she started her task. "I guess it's just, whatdacallit? Post adrenaline rush. Fighting makes me happy."

"Yeah…I know the feeling…Still, you never struck me like that."

"What that?"

"All giggly and hyper."

"You don't really know much about me, now do you?" Her tone changed to seductive, leaning in closer.

"Care ta enlighten me then?"

She snickered even as she wrapped some bandages around him, "Fine then. I shall tell you the very engaging story of me. Just remember this is highly secret information—ya can't tell anyone about this."

She couldn't help but grin, sliding her fingers over his arms. She had finished up pretty quick (Kojirou had healed a lot), but she was still pretending to inspect him. Though his skin was tough it was still just as sensitive, if not more, than hers; and he was hoping she wasn't about to stop, "I had a fun childhood, well it didn't start out fun." She took a moment to think, "Yeah, I'll start back here. I had the classic poor child syndrome: my mom loved me a lot but she had to work all the time, and I was always longing for more:, more time ta spend with her, more food and clothes, more toys, more friends. My dad was some dead-beat bum who visited every so often and I just wish I could see him again so I could punch him in the face. But whatever, I can honestly say I don't care; I didn't need him. Mom worked for the Rocket Gang." She caught Raph's eyes widening, "I know. And one day she was sent out on a mission to capture a rare pocket monster in…the Andes Mountains or something. She died." She sighed, "It hurt a lot back then; I was seven; I didn't even fully understand the impact the _moment_ I heard the news…But…I moved on. I took to the streets." She smiled and nodded, "THAT was _the_ life. I mean, I guess you guys wouldn't smile upon it, being crime-fighters an' all, but there was just nothing so care-free, so thrilling. I became an infamous cat-burglar and was rather enjoying the name I'd made for myself. Then one day this fat, butt-ugly_thing_ comes out of no where and kidnaps me. TS…man, if I could ever get my hands on that thing. The only good that happened in those years was me meeting Ura."

"Huh?" Raph blinked, trying to remember. He'd heard the name TS before…oh yeah, Ura HAD mentioned it. "What is TS?" He asked, hoping to bag two birds with one stone.

"Probably some sadistic, maniacal demon. It just went around kidnapping little girls and doing terrible stuff with them. But I got off lucky." She smirked, "I think I got to TS. It sent me away to join the Rocket Gang—yeah I know. But back then I was really patriotic and stuff: it was my mother's organization. And it specialized in stealing and living the life I had been enjoying before." She chuckled, "Can you believe that's where I met Kojirou? Man, you shoulda seen him. I have no idea what he was doing there, but he looked like a fish outta water surrounded by these rough, gangly, downright ugly senior officers. I took to protecting him—otherwise they would have pounded him into purée. He was the one who talked me out of the business, and I'm glad. I'm also glad I'm alive to talk about it. Rocket Gang members don't quit. But we were lucky to get in with TEAM. At first it was just the thing about protection; the Dan would never get us there. But then…you know…it felt nice being on the right side for once." She thought for another moment, smiling at how close she was to him, "That's probably all there is to tell."

Unlike Ura, who had been hiding any kind of emotion, Musashi truly seemed to have gotten over the past, laughing at memories.

"Hey, Raph." She interrupted his thoughts.

"What?"

"You think NOW those pain-in-the-butt leaders of ours won't mind us makin out? I know your past and you know mine."

"Heh…please"

"And Raph."

"What?"

"I…I just love your voice." She purred, in a cross between merry and sultry, "I'm…_not_ sorry for what happened before." She got real serious, "I think, I think I like you. After all—" She said quickly, "Time doesn't determine how well people know each other. People could be together for years and still have no clue."

* * *

Karen glared at the noise box from the corner of her eyes, "Mikey dear." She moaned, hand on her head, "Either turn that nonsensical thing off or lower it."

She turned her back on him, satisfied with his whiney compliance. Don had taken April home and now she was sitting at the table with Leo, Kojirou, and Splinter, "Sorry…" She sighed, rubbing her eyes, "I just hate having to make plans when there's so little to go on. Even though we were there, we still don't have sufficient data. At least not enough to make a safe and reasonable strategy."

"I guess we'll just have to make the best of it and work quickly. After all," Leo said, "it'll only be a short amount of time before either Musashi or Raph decides to go out fighting on their own."

Karen's eyes shot open, "Uh, just a minute guys. Something just doesn't feel right…Like we escaped too easy—I mean, of course it helps having a psychic on your side so you can teleport anywhere anytime…but…Kojirou, what if they followed us back here?"

"How?" Leo asked with raised eye ridge, "I mean, I could understand that concern if we had walked back, but it's not like they could follow a teleportation trail."

"Unless they have a psychic with them, and they probably would."

Karen's hand flew over her mouth, realizing. "They know where we are, where you guys live?"

"It wouldn't be that accurate." Kojirou assured, "More like our general direction—like they might know we're in this part of the sewer district."

"Well while that's better than it could have been, it's still not good news." Leo said, "Even if Donnie did manage to completely camouflage the entrance—"

The perimeter alarms went off.

"—The sewers will be crawling with Foot soldiers." Leo finished grimly.

"Donnie." Karen whispered to herself, before excusing herself.

"What are we gonna do Leo?" Mikey asked, leaning over the back of the couch.

He stood silent for a moment after silencing the alarms, looking around at them all, "Nothing. We let them search and hope they get tired."

"And we ought to be leaving you in peace soon." Kojirou said, "That should throw off their lead…"

"But won't it put you guys in danger?" Mikey asked.

Meanwhile, Karen had been on the shell cell, "Donnie?..." She let out a relieved sigh when he replied, "Yeah it's me; I was just making sure you were okay. And I need to warn you. The Foot have swarmed the sewers. Be extra careful coming back, won't you."


	26. Chp 25: Old Habits

**Chapter 25: Old Habits**

Her 'room' hardly deserved to be called such. It was near completely empty, devoid of any personality of its inhabitant, unless weapons, items concerning weapons, and neatly folded clothes counted. There was merely a cot, and not too far away on the floor were some comics about the old TEAM that Mikey'd kindheartedly lent her to entertain her, books from Leo for the same purpose, and a radio Don had insisted she'd keep in case she wanted something to fill the lifeless void of the place.

Ura hated the strong smell of the cleaning solvent; it made her feel light-headed. But she focused on what she was doing—scrubbing the floor on her knees with such zeal one would think that each tiny dirt particle was a Foot or dan'in.

Leo watched her curiously for a second before speaking up. "You should be resting."

She didn't stop what she was doing, but she slowed down to mechanical movements. "Not good enough Leo…"

He paused. There were a number of ways to take that; either she was complaining that the spotless floor was somehow not clean enough or…she was talking about herself and merely taking it out on the floor. There wasn't much doubt in his mind, but he decided to play the oblivious game for the moment.

"You have the neatest room out of all of us. There is no need for this."

"Yes there is." She replied, cold and calm, as if the floor had done her some grave wrong, "It's not perfect. And no matter how often it's scrubbed, it'll keep getting dirty." She slapped the wet rag down, squeezing her eyes shut and shaking her head vigorously, "I can't stand it!"

He closed the distance, gently grabbing her arm before she could snatch the treasured possession back. Red was showing through the bandages he'd wrapped around her hands earlier. "Nothing's perfect, Ura." He tried to look her in the eyes but she stared her arms dully.

He followed her gaze, half expecting to see self-mutilation scars at this point.

He suddenly realized that he both knew and didn't know her at all. He knew she was a dedicated warrior like himself whose experience made up for age. He knew her birthday, her hometown, her preferred pastime, her pessimistic outlook, her zeal for training, and her favorite food; but he also knew that there were things she kept from them all. Given what he did know about her, he knew what he didn't know couldn't have been ill intentions towards him and his family. He knew, he _knew_, that she considered them her family. That she _treasured_ them.

That's why it bothered him not to know how to help her, get past the barricade she'd made.

He tried. "I don't know what you're upset about, but if this has anything to do with you and Raph getting captured, just…just stop blaming yourself. You did the best you could, no one was seriously hurt, and if it weren't for you it would have taken us a lot longer to know something was wrong and find the location. You did nothing wrong. You did _well_." He emphasized, hoping for some sort of reaction. Her gaze remained on the floor. "So, just…Lie down and rest now."

He let her go and stood. Looking down he realized that she was looking up at him now, and her eyes looked like those of a tired and despondent child. And eyes that sent emotions he knew well and had felt before. Failure. Self-loathing.

"And that's an order." Said he, lightly but unmoving.

She offered him a fake smile, leaving the rag where it was and sitting on her bed.

Slightly satisfied, Leo turned to leave.

"You think I'm crazy now." Her voice startled him; she had gone back to staring at the floor, "Don't you?"

"No." He said simply.

Ura merely hunched over, hanging her head. _It's just not good enough_.

"Ura." He stopped where he was and turned around again, walking back over to her, "Could you do me a favor?"

"Whatever you say, Leo." She said, tone lighter, supposing he was about to assign her to some task wherein she could redeem herself. Something in him hurt.

"Lie down…the other way, on your stomach."

Ura found it a strange request but listened without much hesitation.

He smiled at her trust, "Splinter taught us a stress-reducing technique. I haven't really gotten a chance to practice, and it seems you could use it." He explained absently, positioning himself and starting to massage her, rubbing deep into her back. He _felt_ the weight lift off her as she calmed down with his touch. A smile crawled on her face as she let out a soft moan. She was relaxing, and that made Leo feel good.

It wasn't gone, but at least she'd forgotten about it for the moment.

Old habits die hard after all.


	27. Chp 26: Of Pestering

**Chapter 26: Of Pestering**

"So? What's that stuff supposed to do?"

Stockman let out a strange frustrated noise, "How am I supposed to get any work done with this whiney brat breathing down my neck?!" He demanded aloud.

Warui was unmoved, "C'mon wise guy; tell me. I wanna know."

Walking into the lab, Hun grabbed the teen by the shoulder, likewise irritated, "What I want to know is why on earth did Master Shredder let this little pipsqueak live."

She merely smiled, bringing her elbow down on his arm hard and thus making him release her, and then stuck out her tongue at him.

She'd been hanging around, feeling out and leeching off people for the last couple of days. She'd managed to get on the bad side of Hun and Stockman; Karai mostly ignored her; Chaplin and most of the scientists were intrigued; Basho fearfully and respectfully avoided her; Marianne tried to pick a fight with her; and Francine chatted with her like old friends.

She had to admit, the Shredder had lived up to her expectations. She'd used up to fifty-percent of her potential against him and they'd wound up tied. The impressed feeling must have been mutual because he offered to 'let her play', which she happily accepted.

She grinned. He had _so_ not been expecting her to just throw down her weapons and agree.

It was funny; to think that he had been accusing her of working for some…turtles? What was that? Some sort of soccer team? Maybe the Foot leader was losing his mind… That was never a good thing.

He probably didn't know what to do with her. One moment she was a complete hyperactive annoyance, and the next she was a deadly serious strategist and philosopher. Her wings and ability to 'jump ages' sent many a mind whirling. And she liked it.

"Fine. I'll tell you if you shut up." Stockman glared, wishing she hadn't suddenly become the Shredder's new ally. He'd just love to take that winged creature to the experiment table and find out what she really was. "I am constructing a virus for biological warfare, thus resuming our deal with the Rocket Dan as they have agreed to restart their half of the bargain."

She seemed to sober up even as she snatched one of the vials and stared at it, "No way."

"Don't doubt my genius." He snatched it right back with one of his mechanical arms, "And don't mess with it you fool. One accident could spell the ruin of us all."

"Not me. I'm half poison sprite. Nothing affects me."

"Hmph. We'll just see about that." He said under his breath.

"What does it do exactly?" She persisted.

"It will be designed to be given to pocket monsters and animals in small doses. It revives dead cells, as well as strengthening the subject in invulnerability to pain and a strong focus on eliminating its adversaries. There might be some side-effects, but I assure you they are minor annoyances."

Warui merely stroked her chin thoughtfully. Minor annoyances indeed! Stockman was a maniac…in more ways than one. She scowled at his holographic face. And handing such a thing over to the Dan would spell disaster. But, she wasn't about to do anything about it. Not yet. Let the mortals have their fun.

"I do not attempt to deny that I highly disapprove of this method of biological warfare, and that I am not at all fond of any of these transactions between the Foot and the Dan." She said with such seriousness it made you wonder if she was the same person who had been so happily exasperating before, "Understand that should anything go wrong, and stupid mistakes be made, I _will_ immediately withdraw _my_ support."

"Indeed." Stockman muttered, unconcerned, "I assure you, _little girl_, nothing will go wrong."


	28. Chp 27: Breaking the Stalemate

**Chapter 27: Of Breaking a Stalemate**

They were shadows, moving noiselessly from one spot to another and up to the world above. Their journey had been silent and without incident. Whether or not the Foot had truly given up the search for a week or not was unknown as they noiselessly set out.

Today would be the day they broke the stalemate. Neither they nor their enemies had been successful in making gains heretofore. But now they were ready to move in and strike hard.

"Leo, move your big fat shell!" Mikey complained.

Leo's mental train was broken, but he resisted the urge to snap back to the immature comment. Waiting a moment more, he rolled over behind the dumpster, signaling for the rest to follow.

The sun had just set, and they had agreed to meet at the Golden Prince Hotel. It seemed safer and Mikey had been dying to see what kind of suites the four-star inn offered.

Now they obviously wouldn't be walking there and using the front doors…

Leo suddenly made a face, realizing something. He'd been so used to traveling with his brothers, all physically adept as he when it came to double jumps, flips, and the more complicated acrobatics. Expecting he had to carry her, he looked to Ura while the others leapt atop the fire escape of the nearest building. She merely grinned innocently before revealing shuko (ninja climbing claws) attached to her hands; her look read: "C'mon, don't you know me by now?"

* * *

_All the others had just left, something about getting supplies. All the plans had been made. They had approximately five hours until they set out. They wouldn't strike at night—the Dan was most active at night. They would wait until early morning._

_Karen suddenly sighed, suddenly wondering why she had stayed behind. Not knowing what else to do, she grabbed a magazine and sprawled on the sofa, comfortably lying her head down upon its arm._

_She hoped the others didn't take too long._

_Suddenly a familiar purple-masked face appeared above hers. "Donnie!" She jumped, "I thought—I didn't—how long?—"_

_He put a finger to his mouth to silence her, before kissing her. Deeply. Passionately._

_Karen was shocked…but not unpleased…but still shocked. She couldn't believe that Donnie, the quiet and introverted one, the last suspect, would suddenly become so…bold. She didn't care for the complications; she just leaned in and kissed back._

_He let go, too soon, she thought, standing up. "I-I'm sorry, Karen. I don't know what came over me."_

_She merely got up and closed the distance, "No, don't apologize." She whispered fervently, looking into his embarrassed, infatuated eyes before kissing him and running her fingers over his arms._

_She coaxed and encouraged him, and, although he fumbled a bit at first, he was a fast learner. And before she knew it—_

_Kojirou's voice intruded._

Karen awoke with a gasp, finding herself tangled in a blanket on the couch. Kojirou looked at her strangely, going to the kitchen where he heard a strange rattling on the window.

It had been a dream. Embarrassed and flustered, Karen untangled herself and decided to go straightway to take a shower.

"They're here." Kojirou announced, finding the turtles and Ura at the window instead of some menacing monster pigeon.

Karen didn't quite hear, or realize, and was quite flabbergasted to finally get to her feet and be facing Don himself. She froze, eyes widening and heat coming to her cheeks.

"Hey, Karen…are you ok?"

Her knees felt weak. It had felt so real, so…she had to look down and make sure she was still wearing something, "Huh…uh, yeah, hi. Excuse me." She muttered, unable to look him in the face as she brushed past a very confused Donatello for the bathroom. And even in 'brushing past' contact with him she felt her heart flutter.

She could still feel his gentle, intoxicating touch as his fingers learned every part of her, and how he'd carried her to her room and to her bed, and—

_Aw man. _ She thought still a mess of emotions and feelings as she blasted the cold water, _That was just too real_. She felt overwhelming shame that such thoughts abode in her subconscious…and that she had enjoyed it.

_It's bad of me, very bad of me. How would I like it if he thought of me like…that…_ She realized she _would_ like if he had fantasies of her too.

_It's all TS' fault. Surely some part of its brainwashing has survived in the back of my head._

She growled, hurriedly drying up and getting dressed, "Have to stop these crazy notions. Have to be professional. We have big events coming up, and I can't afford to be screwing up."

It didn't matter, all her resolve left her when she found Donnie waiting outside for her, looking worried.

"Did I do something wrong?"

"No." She quickly took to looking at the ground. She just couldn't look at his face.

"Karen?" He put a hand on her shoulder and felt her tremble and shrink back, "I can tell something's bugging you."

"I…just don't feel very well." She realized he was still waiting for more, and looked at him for a second before returning to the ground and motioning with her hands, "It's just the anxiety that prevails before a mission—makes me a bit queasy."

He seemed to buy it. "Do you always get like this? Perhaps I should make you some—"

"I'll be all right, Don. Happens all the time. Really. Thanks." She managed hurriedly, smiling at him for a nanosecond before walking ahead. She winced internally. He really was sweet and caring…

_Focus, Karen, focus._

Donnie watched her walk off. He knew something was up. Karen didn't lie half as well as she thought she did. At least, there was no fooling a ninja like himself. He could sense her emotions.


	29. Chp 28: Distractions

**Chapter 28: Distractions**

"Hey, Musashi."

"Whmm?" She glanced at Don curiously, chip between her teeth and controller in her hand.

"So, Karen is always the one to initiate the arrangements?"

Musashi made a weird face, nodded, and finished chewing, "Koji too."

"It's pretty selfless of her to take it all on, considering she gets worried and sick and all."

Musashi nodded, snarling as Mikey snagged the gem she'd had her eyes on. Then she stopped, "Huh? No, Karen never gets nervous or sick. Well, okay, there was this one time she caught the flu, but what does that have to do with anything?"

"Interesting."

"Why would you think she has some sorta nervous-disorder? I mean, panicky's the one thing I can't honestly call her. Karen!" She yelled.

Karen irately poked her head out of the other room, "What is it? I'm in the middle of something."

"Why are you lying to Donnie for?"

She growled, "What?"

"Karen, if you don't tell me what's really bothering you, how can I or anyone else help you." Don tried.

She would have said something, but just then Leo interjected from behind her, nearly frightening her to death, "You know it won't do you any good to stay brooding over it. It'll blind your senses and jeopardize your wellbeing. Your behavior right now reveals that you are unfocused."

She froze, eyes wide, realizing everyone was staring at her, even Mikey and Musashi had pulled their gazes from the glowing screen.

"I just had a bad dream! It's no big deal. Why does everyone make a big fuss over this?! It's nothing! It's none of your business." She ranted, fully worn, as she marched to her room and shut the door (never slamming, but locking instead).

Everyone else just looked at each other before going back to their business.

"Yep. Something's definitely eating her." Mikey concluded.

"Yeah, she sounds like you, Musha." Raph said, sitting next to Musashi. She responded by flicking him in the head, not so good-naturedly, he punched her on the arm not so lightly, she shoved him, and soon the two were at it again.

Mikey was upset. He'd been just about to win the game too.

Kojirou merely glared at Don, as if he thought it was his fault. He was tempted to read minds and find out what was really going on, but he'd promised Karen never to thus intrude upon such a personal ground without permission.

Feeling bad that he'd gone about it wrong and pushed her further away, Don took a step towards the door. Ura put a hand on Don's shoulder. "It's okay. She ought to be fine after a while."

She turned, "So Leo? Are we supposed to be meditating now or something?"


	30. Chp 29: Of Economic Principles

**Chapter 29: Of Economic Principles and Flying Time**

"Are you sure this is a good idea?"

"Nothing is free. Victory must be paid for." Warui said calmly, moving another pawn as she played chess with Francine, "Basic principle of economics and entrepreneurship."

"If this plan fails…"

"Shredder, sir, we will be applying my favorite concept of deception. True, we won't know the final price we must pay. We must wait for their next move before we can move again. But you can be pretty sure it might work. It's all a matter of time."

He slammed his gauntlet down upon the board, making Francine jump (Warui remained as unmoved as ever), "You had better hope it works; the 'price' is too high for us to afford to lose. I will have your head severed from your body should you fail, Warui." He stormed off.

"That's nice." She looked at the terrified Rocket executive, "I think I would look cool without a head, yes?"

Francine only moved her terrified gaze to her, "You…alarm me sometimes."

"Thank you."

"But…what if after all this we still lose?"

"Darling, there is little that brings me more satisfaction than fighting for a losing cause and turning the odds."

The Rocket executive merely started picking up the pieces, not thinking too much on the phrase lest she get overly confused.

"But seriously. For someone so sure he's going to 'rule the universe' you'd think sir Shredder ought to be a good deal more cheery and light-hearted. What good is all that crankiness going to do?"

* * *

The plan was simple enough. They'd settled on splitting into two groups—one would plant the explosives, the other would search the premises to make sure no innocents would be left in there. It was a hard decision to come to: the turtles were ninja, but still as often as possible they tried to avoid _killing_ their opponents if they didn't know them well enough to pass judgment—they had even tried to save the megalomaniac Garbageman the first time they met him. But Karen had insisted that the Dan deserved no less, they had no honor, their hands were covered with blood, they would escape the law, there would be too many problems in defeating them all and calling in the police.

They had agreed to strike the newfound Rocket Gang hideout. The Shredder had thus far proven immortal, and the Foot had an empire in Manhattan. The Dan, however, was the smaller group, immigrated from Nomékop. Destroy one of the two parties and their alliance would fall, and it would be back to dealing with one enemy at a time.

Karen had tried to split it up as evenly as possible: Don and Kojirou would go sneaking around looking for people to save, while the rest of them provided distraction and set everything up. Overbearing power wasn't exactly Don's forte, and Kojirou was purely defensive—they needed a strong fighter with them. But when Karen tried to put Musashi with the two, the fire sprite had offered complaint after complaint at being picked for the 'passive' job as she called it. Knowing her heart wouldn't be in it and she wouldn't offer help to anyone, Karen consented begrudgingly with her and gave Ura the job instead.

Timing was essential. The main group had to make sure Don, Kojirou, and Ura were off the premises before starting the ten minute countdown.

After all, ten minutes might have seemed like a long time. But one never knows the trouble one can run into that can make time fly.


	31. Chp 30: Perspectives

**Chapter 30: Opposing Perspectives**

_This is great._ Musashi thought contentedly, leaning back in her seat. Don was driving the way cool Battle Shell, and Karen and Leo were behind her, still discussing plans and all that other boring crap. Musashi wished Don would drive faster—she didn't know how much more she could take before she completely burst at the seams. She closed her eyes. There was nothing better than this feeling before battle. Heh, she could finally get some sweet revenge on the Gang for trying to hunt her down years earlier and taking her mother from her. Explosives too—that was just the best.

Her eyes shot open and she suddenly complained to Mikey that they should be stuck with such uptight people—it would have been the perfect ride with music blasting, but nooo

Oh well. She took out her weapons, admired them, and then looked at Raph across from her. Okay, perhaps he was a tad more serious than her at the moment, but she could just sense the tense energy emanating from him. Hey, did that make her part psychic? Nah…it just made her poetic.

She just couldn't stand how cute and threatening he was looking, eyes dark and intense. He was just such a kick-butt, angry, bad boy with all his muscles, tough voice, and bad attitude. She was surprised enemies didn't just go running when they saw him…or swooning for that matter…

"Hey, Raph, my fellow berserker. I issue a challenge—let's see who can beat more punks between the two of us, yeah?"

Musashi felt little to no worry before battles.

* * *

If it could be said that Musashi had no care in the world, the exact opposite could be said for Karen.

Perhaps the Rocket Gang wasn't the sneakiest, or the most talented, but they weren't pushovers either.

She'd never forget that time she, Kenji Wu, Jason Bolen, Penny Card, Ho Fai, and Karen Driver were sent to take down the base in Sekigahara, Murto. It had been her first mission, and she alone had survived.

Her reward? TEAM had decided to 'reward' her by promoting her over a group of three. Just what she always wanted(!)

She remembered the look on Bolen's face as he realized what had happened—the consummate despair that drove him mad once he realized_he_ had led his team to their deaths. Nothing she said could get through to him; she had been unable to do anything as he abandoned her and ran back into the flames as if he could save one of them.

This was not what she wanted. She _hated_ being 'leader'. She couldn't think of a thing she hated more—not bugs, not dogs, not arguments with Musashi.

She dreaded Sekigahara. It symbolized so many negative things for her. The name became synonymous with costly mistakes, atrocious failures, struggles, death, madness.

She knew she shouldn't be working herself up so. But she couldn't help it. The bad feeling was rising like an uncontrollable tide. In fact she felt she might very well get sick after all.

But, of course, she hardly let it show—Musashi didn't notice for sure (she was too busy talking with Michelangelo and Raphael about trivial things), Donnie was driving, Kojirou was storing energy, Ura was lost in her own thoughts, staring out the window.

Leonardo was looking at her though.

Karen merely shook her head and continued to inspect weapons. Ura had her heavy, two-handed, double-edged sword and despised guns immensely, Musashi had two curved blades and merely thought they were more fun, Karen had a light sword, but she wasn't adverse to using any kind of weapon including guns, Kojirou, in fact, had no other weapon besides a handgun and his elemental powers.

She was so sick about always having to rack her mind for all the possible negative outcomes, tactics, contingencies—always worrying but never allowed to show how tired she felt. And not only did she have to come up with the smartest plans all the time, no exceptions, she but then she had to fight with certain members of the group (not giving any names) to get them to listen to her.

Then there was the rendezvous at Kyushu off the coast of Starlit, also against the Roketto Dan. Her senior officers had given her a new group—Musashi Miyamoto and Kojirou Sasaki had just joined the splendid little TEAM. From the start Musashi hadn't been taking orders. Now as she looked back at it, Karen just had to wonder what in the world the senior officers were thinking—Musashi had just quit the Dan and they wanted them to go up against them. It was a wonder Musashi didn't turn on them.

Karen had found her team surrounded, in a situation similar to that Bolen had found his team in…and she'd had them pull out, retreat, teleport.

She figured Musashi had never forgotten about that either. She had raged on and on that night about how it was a stupid idea to withdraw, and how they had supposedly had the enemy begging for mercy, and how Karen didn't know what she was doing, was a wimp, didn't deserve her position.

"Leonardo, I…" She collected herself, keeping her voice strong and fine, "I wish to thank you and your brothers for your aid in this endeavor."

He looked at her quizzically, "Why?"

She didn't answer for a minute. She had asked herself that same question. The arrangement was mutually beneficial; they both had enemies on the inside; technically, no one would be indebted to anyone else. But…it was the nice thing to say. And it's a good idea to say nice things before…entering the abode of potential torture and death. Say nice things before it was too late. "You risk your happiness and lives upon us, whom you've known for so short a time."

"Karen" He cracked an easy smile that was light-hearted and yet understanding at the same time, "That's what friends are for."

She returned the smile coyly. "You make them work." She said after a while.

"What?"

"Abused and overused lines. You make them sound good without even trying."


	32. Chp 31: Act III

**Chapter 31: Act III**

"I merely wish to say, that while I would otherwise find you, your character, and your mannerisms, irreproachable—indeed, of excellent quality—I place myself at odds with you for one clear and distinct reason."

Ura shook her head, having no idea what Kojirou was talking to Don about. But she could tell something was up. Kojirou always used complicated and formal language when he was about to verbally attack someone. Her heart sunk, but she continued her work at picking the locks.

Donnie was obviously confused by the water sprite's sudden and amazingly quiet outburst as well, for he had neither reply nor any idea of how to accept this strange revelation.

"Stay away from my girlfriend." Kojirou hissed simply.

"What are you—"

"Don't play innocent. If I were petty and vengeful, I might warn you to watch your back on this mission run. But. I am a professional, and I do not mix off-time emotions with the job. I shall protect you as my ally in this field."

"Listen, I don't know what you think is going on between us, but… Karen and I are simply good friends." He said softly—almost half-heartedly, Ura noted.

"Yeah well you're getting too close."

"I think you should let Karen make that decision—she's old enough and can take care of herself."

Ura frowned and sighed to herself. Kojirou really was worked up and rambling. He wouldn't be concentrating, and obviously Karen hadn't been thinking either to pair Don and Koji together. With all that fuming, even mild Donnie was sure to get a little unfocused.

She mentally kicked herself. And now she was getting distracted too. Leo and Splinter'd be so disappointed.

She finally got the lock after a painful broken claw or two and motioned noiselessly for them to follow.

As soon as they had been a block away they'd gone into stealth mode, leaving the Battle Shell hidden. They'd split into two groups, entering from different sides. The others had taken the more direct and obvious route for a distraction to buy them time to make a thorough search inside.

All dan bases had a basic layout they all followed: one entrance to an underground hallway with many doors leading to different halls which led to rooms. Typically the prison\torture area they were looking for was located at the furthest end, posing a difficult challenge for any escapee.

And it would have been a problem for them had there not been the ventilation shafts. They had entered and shorted the cameras. After a good portion of crawling, group 2 had found itself in a storage room.

They had traveled as far as they could, and, if Don's calculations were correct, they were at the southern tip of the labyrinth.

Fortunately Kojirou did decide to play professional and let it go as they stepped out into the darkness. They couldn't have been too far; Ura could smell the repugnant odors of the injured and dying. Suddenly, Don stopped her, placing a hand on her shoulder.

Musashi had teased him endlessly for looking ridiculous, but it turned out whatever goggles he had put on enabled him to see very plainly that there was a laser-filled corridor ahead. Whether they were alarm triggers or instant death didn't really make a difference—they didn't want to touch them.

* * *

He was so pumped. It might have been a rotten plan, but there was no use fussing about it. Though he had offered various objections of his own, he didn't wanna cause trouble and it _was_ a good idea…he just didn't know why it had to be _him_.

He nervously ambled down the corridor. _This is soo Eighth Tracking-ish, like a monster could pop out at any corner_. He tried to block-out the creepy dark halls and focus on his part, but he took out his nunchaku and twirled them for comfort.

He couldn't help but let out an 'eep' when the door directly in front of him suddenly flew open and two drunken dan'in stumbled out of the flashing lights and pounding music.

They stood looking at him dumbfoundedly for a second, and the next second were on the ground.

Mikey let out a breath of relief but nearly screamed in fright as 1) more dan'in poured out from behind them, 2) another two doors in the hall opened, and 3) one of the rockets sounded an alarm.

Nimbly back flipping away and barely dodging a few bullets, he darted back down the corridor as fast as he could with a large number of dan'in on his tail.

He couldn't help but grin as he reached the corner and rounded it, letting Leo's swords greet the closest rockets.

He and his eldest brother fought side by side for a few moments. The dan'in with the guns raised the stakes and grated on nerves, but both ninja were well-versed and skilled in the elegant dance of battle. Well-aimed shuriken took care of gunners, and the common dan'in were no match for the chelonian warriors in hand-to-hand combat.

The common dan'in weren't, but after that first wave, the higher ups came running in response to the alarm. Then Mikey and Leo began to be pushed back. There was a stark contrast between the black and the beige uniforms, especially when a few sprites manifested themselves.

But just then reinforcements came. Raph, Musashi, and Karen jumped in, seemingly from nowhere, throwing the dan'in into confusion. Musashi cheerily put her fire to good use while Raph disposed of a tranquilizer gun aimed at Leo.

Mikey's seeming carelessness had been part of the plan to boost the dan'ins overconfidence and lure them out. It had been part of the plan to make it seem like they were dealing with two bizarre, overzealous infiltrators. It had been part of the plan to make it seem like Musashi, Raph, and Karen were the only back-up they had. It was part of the plan to make it seem like they didn't know what they were doing.

* * *

"Mistress Marianne!" A dan'in said, bowing as he entered the throne room, "There has been a breach in security and we've found the perpetrators: a human, a fire sprite, and three costumed freaks."

"And? Why are you telling me this? Take care of it, you fool! Make use of the scorps and hunters if you have to! I don't care." The dark sprite snapped, crossing her legs and folding her arms. "I will not have any incompetence on my watch."

Yes. She'd just received a promotion; tonight was her first night as an executive and boss of the base. Ah, she just relished this chance to shine! She'd outperform that annoying pest of a sprite Warui. She'd continue to climb to the top, whatever it took from assassination to seduction. She made it a point to not thank Warui for this promotion. That arrogant brat! Master's precious prized dark sprite was hardly two years old and yet she was always such a know-it-all. Always so calm and collected and ugh…

Marianne would never admit that she envied her.

But now she could exalt herself, remembering that Warui was only Master's pet, the Himitsu Kessha's servant. Marianne aspired to be the Boss, not the boss' pet; her rule would be successful and it would be over an entire syndicate and then the world. That idiotic little girl! Content with being the Master's slave...


	33. Chp 32: Cages

**Chapter 32: Cages**

Someone was watching them.

And somehow, all three of them knew it, sensed it.

They'd managed to get past the laser hall miraculously. The thoroughly prepared Donnie had pulled out some sort of spray can and used it so all could see the trip lines. Then he had had no problem with his elegant flipping and somersaulting; Kojirou had merely teleported; Ura didn't want to think about it; it had been humiliating, dangerous, nearly given her a heart attack, nearly ruined it for all of them, and just proven the fact that she had no feline grace whatsoever.

Yet they'd gotten through without missing limbs or sounding the alarm. They'd continued down the hall until they came to a junction and halted there, feeling discouraged by their lack of success.

The someone who was watching them made a soft, unintelligible sound.

"Come out…whoever you are…we're not afraid to face you."

The person didn't come out but ran away from them. With unanimous consent they took off after the person. It couldn't be too big either, the footfalls were too short apart and too quiet.

When Don turned the corner a dreadful sight met his eyes. Empty cages—except for one, but the girl inside that one was dying—she wasn't moving, but just lay there, bloody, not breathing. She couldn't have been older than five.

Ura stayed where she was while Don and Kojirou closed the distance. After the inspection, Kojirou shook his head at Don's questioning look. "Can't you do something?" He asked, voice breaking.

"My healing powers are not unlimited." Kojirou said softly. "To bring one back from the gates of death is beyond me."

"We can't just leave her here."

Just then something moved.

One of the cages was open. They remembered then that they had been following something here and collectively reached for their weapons. With another sound, they'd spotted the source. Huddled in the corner of the room, as if trying to hide, as if afraid of them, was another little girl.

Yearning for a chance to rescue anyone from such a place, Donnie made a move towards her, "Are you hurt?"

The girl nearly screamed, backing further away, tears streaming down her scarred cheeks, "Leave me alone! I don't want to die! I want mommy!"

"Don't worry. We're not here to hurt you." Kojirou said, stepping in front of Don and giving him a look as if he had made her scared, "We're here to free you."

The girl seemed to have forgotten her ability to talk, but merely nervously chewed on her ragged nails and looked around the room every so often. _Poor thing. Must have had her head messed up by all she saw_. He himself felt sick. Don shook his head, eyes squeezed shut as he slipped his bo away, hoping to appear at least a tad less threatening. He hadn't been expecting this. He'd envisioned a prison, but nothing like this. And she was just a child for crying out loud. If he had been a skeptic before, he was now certain that the dan should get what was coming to them.

"All right. Let's go then." Kojirou spoke, holding his hand out to the girl, though she shied away from anyone's touch, "Is anyone else still alive?"

"I don't know." The seven year old cried hysterically. "There were a lot. But I don't know. They're around..." She motioned with her tiny, bandaged hands, careful not to look at the place where the dead girl was.

At her outburst, another prisoner appeared, his young face raw and bloody, peering hopelessly through the bars of his cell, and there was a soft sound in one of the cages as though something had moved. Nothing else stirred or gave a sound. The room was rancid, cold, desolate.

"Well." Kojirou looked to Don and Ura, admonishing them for just standing there dumbly, "Let's get to work, shall we?"


	34. Chp 33: Chad Cole

**Chapter 33: Chad Cole**

"They're running away."

"Grrr…" Musashi took off after the few Rocket executives, "Come back here and accept your punishment!"

Leo and Karen took a millisecond to look at each other, both acknowledging that it could be a trap, before following Musashi and Raph with Mikey behind them.

Musashi had gotten one, two, three of them down and was chasing after the one who still frantically and half-hazardly avoided her attacks. He turned and ran blindly into a room, sweat pouring down his face, and Musashi, not thinking, followed him. Raph and Mikey were right on her heels, and Karen couldn't manage to stop her momentum or yell a warning to the others.

The door behind them slammed shut with them trapped inside, all of them except Leo.

He was at the metal door in a second, pounding on it, trying to pry it open in vain. "No!"

The guy they'd chased in there spun around, backing up rapidly, his hands in the air, his narrow features contorted with fear, "I'm new—please don't hurt me," he babbled, his pale face slick with sweat—

Karen wished they'd paid more attention. The guy wasn't even wearing a dan'in uniform. He was dressed like an electrician instead. Probably just some naïve worker.

To their left a face appeared at the window, in the metal wall, distorted by the thick plexiglass but obviously grinning. A short brunette, dressed in some blatantly indecent red outfit of ribbons.

She looked away for a moment, one hand reaching up to touch something they couldn't see—and a mocking voice floated into the room from a speaker in the ceiling.

"Sorry, Cole," The woman said, her moving face warped by the glass. "And allow me to introduce myself. I'm Marianne. And whoever you are, I'm _very_ glad to meet you. Welcome to the Planet's test program."

Karen looked to Musashi who still had her blade at the near hysterical Cole's throat. They were in deep…

"We're not scheduled to go on line for another twenty-three days," Marianne continued, smiling widely, already imagining the look on Warui's gloating face, "At which time, I was going to host the initial run of our carefully designed program for a group of extremely important people. It was going to be specimen only, we hadn't planned on putting humans—" She paused momentarily, squinting at the two turtle creatures, but nevertheless continued her self-important monologue, "—through the phases for a while yet, let alone soldiers. But now, thanks to you, I'll be able to show my little party actual footage of what our specimens were created for. The four of you will suffice, I think. Yes, you'll do quite nicely." She scowled again, _What are they? Never mind, I'll merely collect the information from their DNA_. She laughed, "You may want to kill Cole before you start, though, he'll only drag you down—and he _did_ lure you in, didn't he?"

Cole pushed away from the wall and flew at the door, pounding on it with his fists. The two-inch metal didn't even rattle in the frame.

Marianne shook her head, still grinning, "I am sorry, Cole; we'll miss you terribly. You never did finish with the intercom system, did you? Or the audio…at least you hooked up this one, for which I can't thank you enough. Is it clear enough in there? Getting any static?"

Whatever demon had possessed the electrician fled, the man collapsing against the door, breathing raggedly. He watched as the bigger of the two green men, the burly dark one, stepped toward the window with a menacing expression. "You ain't gonna get us to go through no tests for you," he said, his deep voice quivering with rage, "Go ahead and kill us, cuz we're not alone—and the Rocket Gang's goin' down, whether or not we're around to see it happen!"

Marianne sighed, "Well, you're right about not being around. But as to the rest…you and your grassroots campaign are nothing to us; you're mosquitoes," She smirked, thinking of making it a nickname for Warui, "An annoyance. And you will participate—"

"Participate_this_," he spat, hurling both sais at her face, despite the thick plexi.

"Musashi." The winged woman said coolly, "Why don't you break out one of those frag grenades?"

Marianne sighed again, "The walls are plaster-coated steel, and the door will withstand a lot more than you could possibly have. You'd only succeed in blowing yourselves up. It would be a pity—but if you must, you must."

They didn't seem to have a smart reply to that. No one spoke, although Marianne could still hear the troubled gasps coming from Cole through the intercom. She'd grown tired of goading them anyway. "Now I have other business to attend to—like releasing our pets from Dr. Stockman into their new homes. Rest assured, though, I'll be watching your debut; try to make it through at least one of the phases, if you can."

She stepped away from the window to the control panel on the left, and punched in the activation code. One of the green men started shouting that they wouldn't go through with it, that she couldn't make them—

--and then she hit the large green button, the one that simultaneously opened the hatch into One—and released a spray of tear gas into the small anteroom from vents in the high ceiling. She stepped back to the window, interested to see how effective the process was.

Within seconds, a white haze came pouring down from above, obscuring the five. She heard shouts and coughing, and a second later she heard the hatch lock down, which meant they were through. The pressure plates in the floor thus unencumbered, there was a low hiss as the ventilation system kicked on, clearing the room of the mist in under a minute.

Nice. She'd have to remember to commend whichever designer had recommended it.

_See? No problem; I'm boss material. Eat your heart out Warui._

* * *

"All right, so that's what we're going to do." Kojirou concluded as Ura finished picking the cage locks.

"Ura, your Rapidash. Those well enough can ride; Donatello and I will carry the worst injured."

She nodded and tossed the monster sphere to him while she grabbed the shell cell with her free hand as it started to vibrate. That was probably the others waiting for the thumbs-up. Everything would have gone smoothly with them, Musashi was probably complaining that she'd hardly gotten a work out, and they were all waiting in the control center, twiddling their thumbs boredly.

She hoped.

"Yeah?"

"Ura. It's not good. The others got trapped. I-I don't know what's happening to them, I need back up, pronto."


	35. Chp 34: Phase One

**Chapter 34: Phase One**

Chad Cole had no choice but to stumble after the killers, choking and nauseous, his heart sick with dread and hate. He'd been abandoned to death by Marianne, the dark sprite had even encouraged the assassins to kill him—he no longer knew if they even were assassins, he didn't know who they were supposed to be—he didn't know anything except that his eyes were burning and he couldn't breathe.

_At least make it fast, let it be fast and painless_…

Through the hatch into One, the door snapping closed behind him. Cole fell back against the cool metal, struggling to catch his breath, gummy tears leaking from beneath his closed lids. He didn't want to see the blade, he'd rather not have to suffer suspense before he died; dying was plenty enough.

_Maybe they'll just leave me here…_

The small hope that the thought brought him was stamped out immediately as a big rough hand latched onto his arm and shook him.

"Hey, wake up!"

Cole reluctantly opened his watering eyes, blinking rapidly. The big dark turtle guy was staring down at him, looking mad enough to start hitting. His daggers pointed at Chad's chest.

"Want to explain what this place is?"

Cole shrank against the door. His voice came out in a stammer, "Phase One. F-forest."

The red-head rolled her eyes just as angry looking as the red-banded turtle, "Yeah, forest, we got _that_. Why though?"

Cole shook his head, sure that he was about to be severely beaten but not sure what they were asking.

The winged woman took a step toward the three of them, looking more upset than angry, "Raphael, Musashi, Marianne screwed him over, too. What's your name again? Cole?"

He nodded, desperate to appease them. "Yeah, Chad Cole, Marianne told me you were here to kill her and she told me to run in there, she was just going to lock you guys up, I swear I didn't know she was gonna do this—"

"Slow down." She said, "I'm Karen, and this is Raphael, Musashi, and Michelangelo. What can you tell us about this test program?"

Chad swallowed, wiping at the water on his face. Karen seemed sincere—

--_and what are your options here? You can get decapitated, get left behind, or work with these guys. They've got weapons, and Marianne said the test specimens were designed to fight people and—_

Chad looked around at One, amazed at how different it seemed now that he was locked in how—menacing. The towering artificial trees, the plastic underbrush and fallen synthetic logs—with the subdued lighting and humidified air, the dark walls and painted ceiling, it almost felt like a real forest at twilight.

"I don't know a whole lot," Chad said, looking at Karen, "There are three phases—woods, city, mountains. They're all big, each one's like two football fields, side by side, I forget the exact measurements. Word is that they're supposed to be suitable habitats for these hybrid test animals; they're even gonna stock them with live food, mice and rabbits and such. Roketto Dan's testing out some kind of disease-control thing, and the test animals are supposed to have similar circulatory systems to humans, something like that, it'll make good study material…"

He trailed off, noticing the look the two females exchanged when he'd started talking about the test creatures.

"You really believe that Chad?" Raphael asked, not looking enraged anymore, his expression neutral.

"I—" Chad said, then closed his mouth, thinking. About the incredible pay and don't-ask policy. About the questions from whoever was supervising on any given job.

"_Are you happy working here? Do you feel that you're getting paid enough?"_

--and about the prison cells—and the restraints.

"No." He said, and felt a rush of shame at his deliberate ignorance. He should have known, _would_ have known if he'd had the guts to take a closer look. "No, I don't. Not anymore."

All nodded, and Chad was relieved to see Raphael alter the position of his weapon slightly, pointing it away.

"So, do you know how to get out of here?" Michelangelo asked.

Chad nodded, "Yeah, sure. All the phases have connecting doors, in alternating corners. They're all latched shut is all, no keys or anything—expect the last one, Three, it's bolted on the outside."

"So the door we'll want is that way?" Karen asked, pointing southwest. They were in the northeast corner. From where they stood, the far wall wasn't even visible, the fake woods were so dense. Chad knew there was at least one decent-sized clearing, but it would still take a hike to get through. He nodded. "Over the bridge."

"Can you tell us about these test animals? What do they look like?" Michelangelo asked, a hint of fear in his voice.

"I never saw 'em, I was just here to do the wiring—cams and conduits, like that." He looked among the warriors hopefully, "But how bad could it be, right?"

The expressions on Karen's and Musashi's faces weren't encouraging. Chad started to ask what _they_ could tell _him_ when a long, metallic clattering filled the moist air, like a giant gate being raised. It came from the back, the west wall, where Chad knew the animal pens were kept—

--a second later, a shrill, piercing shriek cut through the air, a long and warbling note that was quickly joined by another, and another, and then too many to tell apart.

There was a beating sound too, so huge that for a moment, Chad couldn't place it—and when he did, he felt a little like screaming.

Wings. The sound of gigantic wings beating the air.

* * *

Marianne smiled proudly, still congratulating herself on the job well done. She froze when she felt cold metal touch the back of her neck. 

"Take me to the control center, now." A baritone voice hissed sinisterly.

Marianne bit back rising panic. _Another intruder?_ "And what if I don't?" She tried in her most seductive voice, "You going to make me?"

Didn't work on this one; in fact, he must have been very much out of patience. Marianne gasped as he forced her against the wall blade still at her neck and arm twisted. He was incredibly strong; she couldn't shake his pincer grip. So she tried another tactic.

"O-okay, okay. I'll lead you! Just please don't hurt me." She whimpered.

"Nothing funny." He warned.

She was relieved to feel the cold steel leave her skin and his grip loosen slightly. She slowly turned, not wishing to be rammed against concrete again and couldn't help but gawk, "There are more of them?" She winced as his grip suddenly tightened again.

"You've seen them. You know where my brothers are."

Marianne smiled nastily, "Oh yes. The idiots fell into quite a mean trap of mine." It wasn't the smartest thing she could have done.

She didn't know what he did or how, but the next second she was flat on the ground with a very scary strong turtle guy pinning her down and threatening to slice her throat open.

"_Not so tough now that you've no glass to shield you, eh?"_ She could just hear Warui's derisive voice in her head.

_Shut up._

"What did you do?" He was obviously furious—it emanated from his tone and his eyes—although he was also trying to control it.

"The Rocket Dan has engaged in an excellent trade recently. Base 104, or the Planet as it is affectionately called, is the testing grounds for our prototypes. So right now, your 'brothers' and your little girlfriends should be getting torn to pieces by our pets." She gasped again as his grip tightened even more but was none the wiser and continued her vain taunting, "If you'll go to the control room you can have front row seats for the entertainment."

He realized a second too late that she had pressed some sort of button and looked to see at least ten gun-toting executives in the hall aiming at him. _Yes! I have him now._

"_You're forgetting rule #2!" Said Warui, "Never celebrate your supposed victory unless you are already standing in the ashes of your enemy!"_

Marianne couldn't help but be amazed by his reflexes. He was out of harm's way before she could even think to move. Dodging one, deflecting the other, he moved with agility and had them all disarmed with little difficulty.

But Rocket executives were no pushovers, Marianne thought snottily, watching contendedly as they put up a fight with their clubs and chains. And even though they couldn't stop him—she grabbed a gun that had landed quite near her—they could at least distract him. She smiled as she saw her opening. There he was: that nimble kung-fu turtle had found himself in a deadlock with Burton and Cecila. Near beside herself with euphoria glee that she'd once again proven herself all powerful and capable and all that, she aimed for his head.

The gun clattered to the floor a second later, Marianne near screaming in pain with a shuriken lodged in her hand. The two executives holding him also dropped to the ground in bloody heaps.

"You came quickly, Ura."

His affiliate met his eyes before rolling forward, swiping a knife away from a grasping hand, and grabbing Marianne. She moved almost as fluidly as the ninja himself and now held Marianne tightly in front of her with her arms behind her back and the knife to her throat.

Leo just hoped the rockets were loyal enough to their boss for it to be a profitable move.

Either they really did care for Marianne or were too smart to try to do anything. Ura merely watched as Leo rounded them up and tied them up—too risky to just turn their backs on them after all.

Marianne obviously felt less of the intimidation she had felt when in Leo's grasp because she struggled, head-butted, and brought her stiletto heels down on Ura. Ura exhibited no visible reactions to the onslaught and Marianne soon gave up.

"Now. Lead us to the control room." Leo commanded, focused again on Marianne.

"Doesn't matter. I'm the one in control here; I'm calling the shots. Your friends are about to be blinded, trampled, and eaten! And there's nothing you can do about it!"


	36. Chp 35: Spitters

**Chapter 35: Spitters**

The piping screams had stopped and they didn't hear the beat of wings anymore—but one could only wonder how long it would be before the birds decided to look for prey.

"Let's head for that door." Karen said, already edging into the false, shadowy woods. Mikey started after her, trying to look up and watch his step at the same time. He tripped almost immediately, one foot kicking against a molded plastic rock, and barely caught himself before going into full sprawl.

"This ain't gonna work," Raph said, "Cole—Chad?"

He glanced back and saw that Chad was still huddled against the hatch, his pale, weasely face turned to the ceiling.

Karen had stopped and was waiting, peering up into the spaced branches, "Gotcha covered," She said.

Raph walked back, angry and frustrated and seriously uncomfortable; they were in a tight spot, Leo and the others could very well be fighting for their lives on the surface, and he wasn't going to waste time coddling some freaked-out Rocket chump. Still, they couldn't just leave him behind, at least not without making an effort.

"Chad. Hey, Cole." He reached out and tapped his arm, and Chad finally looked at him. His mild brown eyes were positively glassy with fear.

Raph sighed, feeling a little pity for the guy. He was an _electrician_, for crying out loud, and it seemed that ignorance had been his only real crime. "Look I understand you're scared, but if you stay here, you're gonna get killed. Your best bet is to come wit' us—and besides, we could use your help, you know more about this place than we do. Okay?"

Chad nodded shakily, "Yeah, okay. Sorry. I just—I'm scared."

"Join the club." Mikey tried, "Birds give me the creeps. The flying part's cool, but they're so _weird_, got those beady eyes and scaly feet—and have you ever noticed how they bob their heads all the time?" Mikey mock-shivered, and saw Chad relax a little bit, even trying a quivery smile.

"Okay." He said again more firmly. The walked back to where Musashi and Karen were standing, still watching the air above.

"You know how to work a semiautomatic?" Musashi asked.

"Oh. Yeah. I haven't ever used one, but I went target shooting a couple times with my brother, six or seven years ago…" He kept his voice low, listening for strange sounds.

Musashi looked directly at him, as if sizing him up—then nodded, and pulled a heavy-looking handgun out and handed it to Chad, "It's a nine-millimeter, holds eighteen. Standard KPD handout, but TEAM always preferred blades. I got more clips if you run out."

Chad nodded, taking the gun, and it _was_ heavy, and, although he was still more scared than he'd ever been in all his thirty-four years, the solid weight of it in his hand was an incredible relief. "Thank you." He said and meant it. He'd lured these guys into a trap and they were giving him a gun: giving him a _chance_.

"Chad how 'bout you lead? We'll keep watch and we'll need a clear route so we won't have to worry about trippin' over stuff. Think ya can handle it?"

Chad nodded, and though he still looked too pale, Raph could see that he would hold it together. For a while, anyway.

Their guide stepped in front of Karen and headed roughly southwest, weaving a crooked path through the strange forest. Musashi noticed pretty quickly that having Chad lead didn't make much of a difference.

_If you don't look where you're going, you're going to trip,_ she thought wearily, after the sixth time she ran into a fallen "log." _No way around it._

The creatures hadn't put in an appearance or made any other sound. Just as well; Mikey thought walking through a plastic forest was enough for them to handle. It was a bizarre sensation, seeing the realistic-looking trees and undergrowth, feeling the moisture in the air—but also being aware that there were no smells of earth or growing things, no wind or tiny sounds of movement, no bugs. It was a dream-like experience, and an unnerving one.

Chad stopped.

"We're—there's kind of a clearing here," he said.

Karen turned, frowning at the others, "Should we skirt it?"

Musashi stepped forward, peering through the seemingly random scatter of trees to the opening ahead. It was at least fifty feet across, but she'd rather go out of their way; being dive-bombed by some giant bird didn't sound like fun at _all_.

"Yeah. Chad, veer right. We're going to—"

The rest of her words were lost as that high, warbling screech blasted through the unnatural forest, and a shape dove into the clearing and flew at them, extending talons a foot across.

It was no bird.

Musashi snatched the shuriken right out of Raph's hand, igniting it and hurling it. It wedged into the joint of the wing and the creature fell screaming and thrashing.

Before she could give Raph a high-five, it picked itself up.

They weren't quite sure what they were seeing, except that it was walking, _skipping_ down the hill on four sturdy legs, like a mountain goat.

_Like a skinned goat._

They heard a wet, rattling sound erupt from somewhere behind them, the sound of a snot-clogged throat being cleared, or a dog growling through a mouthful of blood.

The phlegmy rattling sounds seemed to be coming from somewhere ahead—

--and then Chad saw the creature coming slowly toward them from behind and barely held back a scream. It stopped fifteen or twenty feet away, and Chad still couldn't seem to get a good look; it was just too bizarre.

It was four-legged, with split hooves, like a ram or a goat, and was about the same size—but there was no fur, nor horns, nothing else that even remotely resembled a natural development. Its slender body was coated with tiny reddish-brown scales, like a snake's skin, but dull instead of shiny; at first glance, it looked like it was covered in dried blood. Its head was somehow amphibian, like a frog's—an earless flat face, small dark eyes that bulged out at the sides, a too-wide mouth—except there were pointed teeth sticking up form a protruding lower jaw, a bulldog's jaw, its head also covered in dried-blood scales.

The thing opened its mouth, exposing only a few sharp teeth, upper and lower, none of them in the front—and that terrible wet rattling sound came from the darkness of its throat, the bizarre call matched by others somewhere in the forest.

The call built, going louder and deeper as the thing raised its head, turning its hideous face to the ceiling—and in one sudden, jerking motion, it dropped its head and spat at them. A thick blob of reddish semiliquid stuff flew at them, at Karen, across the wide open space—

And Karen raised her arm to block it even as Musashi and Raph charged. The goop hit Karen's arm, would have hit her face if she hadn't blocked, and in response to the onslaught, the Spitter turned and jumped back in long, easy jumps that didn't denote panic or pain or any stress at all.

It loped back about twenty feet, then skipped nimbly in front of the connecting hatch. As if it knew it was blocking their escape.

The multiple cries from just out of sight didn't get any louder, but they didn't retreat, either. The gargling noises stopped, one at a time, the lack of targets giving them no reason to sing; suddenly, it was silent again, as quiet as it had been when they'd entered.

"What was that?"

"Wasn't even hurt." Chad whispered, replaying the attacks in his head which had looked quite vicious to him but hardly scratched its skin. He barely noticed as Karen touched the thick, wet handful of maroon goop on her sleeve—and hissed in pain, drawing her hand back as if she'd been burned.

"Stuff's toxic," She said, quickly wiping her fingers on her shirt and holding them up. The tops of the index and middle fingers on her left hand had gone an angry, inflamed red. She immediately sheathed her sword in the belt around her waist and pulled the shirt off, carefully avoiding contact with the acidic ooze, dropping it to the grass.

Chad felt sick. If Karen hadn't blocked…

"Okay-okay-okay." Raph breathed, his brow furrowed, "This is bad, we want out of here as fast as possible…you say there's a bridge?"

"Yeah, goes over the, uh, trench," Chad said quickly, "Like twenty feet across, I didn't see how deep it was."

"C'mon." Musashi said. She started walking toward the trees, striding quickly. Chad followed, Raph right behind. Musashi stopped about ten feet short, glancing at Karen.

"You want to cover, or me?" Karen asked softly.

"Me," Musashi said, "I draw their fire. You guys run, and head down, got it? Get across, get to the door—if you can, help me out—"

Her face was solemn, "—If you can't, you can't."

Chad felt a by-now-too-familiar rush of shame. _They're protecting _me_, they don't even know me and I got them into this…_If he could do something to return the favor, he would, although he was suddenly quite sure that he'd never be able to even things out; he owed these guys his _life_, a couple times over already.

"Musashi you can't!" Raph objected. "We should just go out there and strike hard and fast."

Musashi merely shook her head stubbornly. "You think I can't handle it?"

"It's better if these things don't touch us…we don't know enough…" Karen stumbled, unsure of how to explain it.

"You mean we could 'catch' it, whatever it is they have?" Mikey asked, voice high and nervous.

"Maybe…" Karen admitted, "So distance attacks are best…"

"Ready?"

"Wait—" Karen turned and jogged back to where she'd dropped the sweatshirt. The Spitter by the hatch stood silent and immobile as a statue, watching them. She scooped up the shirt and hurried back, slipping a pocket knife out of her pack. She cut off the offending sleeve, letting it fall, then handed the rest to Musashi.

"If you're going to be standing still, keep your face covered," She said, "Since they don't seem to notice cuts and slashes, you won't need to see, to attack. Once we're across, I'll give a yell. And if it's not safe, I'll—"

The rattling, peremptory calls had started up again, making Chad think of cicadas for some reason, the almost mechanical ree-ree-reee sound of cicadas on a hot summer night. He swallowed hard, trying to pretend to himself that he was ready.

"Outta time," Musashi said, "Get ready to go—" Without waiting for a reply, Musashi put the shirt over her head, holding it open at the bottom so she could see the floor, and ran ahead.

--and there was a rapid _patpatpat_, and the black material over Musashi's face was suddenly dripping with great strings of the poison red snot, and she jerked her hand at them.

--and Karen said, "Now!" and Chad ran, head down, seeing only Karen's boots sprinting in front of him, a blur of gray rock, his own thin legs as he sprinted. He heard a gurgling cry to his left and ducked down even farther, terrified—

--and there was the thump of wood in front of him, and then he was on the bridge, flat wooden slats rippling underfoot, tied with scrawny twine. He saw the vee-shaped gorge underneath, saw that it was deep, that it had been dug into the earth beneath the Planet, forty fifty feet—

And then he was back on gray land, before vertigo could even occur to him. He ran, thinking of how wonderful it was that all he needed to think about was Karen's boots, his heart hammering. Seconds or minutes later, he didn't know, the boots slowed, and Chad dared to look up. The wall, the wall and there was the hatch! They'd made it!

"Musashi go!" Karen screamed, taking a few running steps back the way they'd come, her semi up and ready, "Go!"

Chad turned, saw Musashi rip off the black hood, saw the handful of Spitters grouped loosely in front of her, six, seven of them, calling once more. Musashi tore through their ranks, and at least two of them spat, but Musashi was fast, fast enough that only a tiny bit hit her shoulder. The monstrous creatures started after her in their jumping, hopping movements, not as fast but close.

Chad pointed the nine-millimeter in the direction of the Spitters, ready to shoot if he thought he could get a clear shot, as Musashi hit the bridge.

Musashi felt the bridge drop an inch or two about half a second before the ropes snapped. And all she heard was a whoosh sound, and then the knuckles of her right hand crashed into rock, and she was dangling over a very deep chasm. Above, more shots, closer, and a shout from Raph that was cut off as more bullets thundered.

Hand over hand was hard enough without bleeding knuckles.

"She's right here!"

A cracked, hysterical shout from directly above. Musashi tilted her head back, saw Chad crouched at the lip of the chasm, his work shirt pulled up over his nose, his gaze frantic and scared.

"Musashi, give me your hand!" He screamed, and reached down as far as he could, flakes of concrete falling from beneath his sliding boots. It only took a split-second for Musashi to react to his command. Chad Cole stood all of five-eight and probably weighed one-fifty sopping wet. With his clothes on. What was more, he looked like some mad turtle hunkered down in the shell of his shirt.

Funny, and touching in an idiotic way, and although her hand still hurt, she'd actually forgotten to feel it for a second or two. She grinned, ignoring Chad's trembling fingers and forcing herself to concentrate on pulling herself up. Speaking of turtles…

"Chad move it! Musashi!"

She recognized the voice above the din and this hand she grabbed, "Tell Karen to use the grenade!" She panted as Raph and Mikey pulled her up.

Chad turned, shouting over another burst from Karen's semi. "…Says grenade!"

"Not yet! Get clear!"

"I'm good, go!"

Chad the mad turtle needed no further incentive. He took off running as Karen continued to cover.

Musashi jammed her injured hand into her pack and pulled out her grenade—she'd already popped the pin when she saw that Karen had her grenade in hand.

No time to think. Musashi threw low, threw as hard as she could, her grenade disappearing into the rift as Karen's landed in front of the others just as they spread their wings—and they were diving and rolling, the blasts almost simultaneous, the sound of powdered rock raining down, an incredibly high-pitched squealing coming from somewhere.

"You got 'em! You got 'em!"

Chad was standing in the front of them, a look of unabashed glee and not a little awe on his narrow face.

They hadn't killed all of them. Two of the four still on the other side of the chasm were mostly intact, alive—but blind and broken, their legs splintered, black fluid obscuring whatever was left of their faces, as they squealed in fury, the sound like a guinea pig being stepped on. The other two were just bleeding, shattered bags, bones sticking up from the liquid piles like—like broken bones. From the manmade gorge there were more of the screaming squeals, and nothing leapt out to attack. For all intents and purposes, it was over.

Musashi crawled to her feet, studying the back of her hand. Contrary to how it felt, the skin hadn't melted off.

"You okay?" Raph asked.

Musashi shrugged, "I'll live."

She saw that Chad was still beaming at them, his body shaking with adrenaline aftermath; he seemed at a lost for words, and Musashi had a sudden clear memory of how she'd felt after her first battle, the first in which she'd acted bravely. How helplessly elated she'd been. How incredibly _alive_.

"Chad, you're a funny guy," Mikey said, clapping his hand on his shoulder and smiling. The electrician grinned uncertainly, and the five of them started for Two, leaving the furious squeals of the dying animals behind.

"Hey, Raph."

"Yeah?" He looked at her with worried eyes and walked closer to her as if he thought she was too injured to walk anymore.

She could have laughed, "I think that brings my count to eleven." She stuck out her tongue, "I'm two ahead of you."


	37. Chp 36: Questioning and Sidelines

**Chapter 36: Of Questioning and Sidelines**

"Why did the Rocket Gang capture you? How long have you been there? What did they want with you?"

The girl in question looked unblinking at Kojirou, but answered not a word.

"We're not going to hurt you." He said, looking from her to the other relatively uninjured child. "We just need to know some information so that we can help you…What's your name?"

Still no response did he get.

"Maybe this isn't the best time to be asking questions." Don said, placing a hand on Kojirou's shoulder. "They did go through a lot."

Kojirou fought the instinctual urge to shrug the hand off, "I know what I'm doing."

Don sighed and went back to wrapping up a boy's wound.

They had miraculously escaped the building with all the live captives they found. The others really had done a good job playing the distraction…too good a job. Both teens were worried, especially after Ura had gone off with a meager explanation about helping Leo. But neither voiced their opinions on the happenings, rather Kojirou healed those he could, and Don took to bandaging others.

"The only thing we can do now is take them to the hospital and inform the police respectively—I'll be doing that obviously. You stay here."

"I don't know Kojirou…the others are taking too long. I think I should—"

"Stay here." Kojirou interrupted, "Last thing you need is to get lost inside with the bomb going off." With that he and the captives disappeared.

Donnie scowled and pulled out the shell cell.

* * *

When the dust cleared and the warriors were sill alive, Marianne slammed her fist against the console in anger and rising dread, her stomach lurching, her eyes wide in disbelief. 

"Get them out of there!" the turtle hissed, angry for a different reason.

Marianne didn't answer. She couldn't believe that they'd made it this far. Most of all, she couldn't believe that she'd let it continue. It wasn't that she was out of her league, she was in the inner circle, she was past that kind of insecurity—but she should have talked to Basho at least, or even Duvall; not for advice, but to cover all of her bases. After all, she couldn't be held totally responsible if she'd had counsel from one of the other members…

It wasn't too late. She'd put a call in, explain her plan, explain that she had some concerns—he could say that the intruders were only in Two, that would help.

"I said release them!"

"They won't survive the Hunters!" Marianne cackled maniacally, "Your friends will be killed in Two…and even if they aren't, they won't be able to get out, and with the backup from the home office!" Marianne reached for something.

Her tirade was cut short as the cat girl struck her in the back of the neck.

"I'm sorry, Leo." Ura said apologetically. "I just couldn't…stand her…and should anything happen to them because of her…"

"That's fine; it didn't look as if she was going to cooperate. If anything, it would have done more harm than good to let her go pressing things." He nodded, looking around at the monitors and numberless buttons. _Just hang on, guys._

It felt awful, just standing there, unable to do anything directly but watch and hope they survived while trying to figure out how to save them…maybe it was how they felt watching him fight the Ultimate Ninja. It was probably good they had gotten to the control room when they did; Leo didn't know what he would have done having to watch two of his brothers, Musashi, and Karen fight for their lives against whatever experiment had been out there. At least they were all still alive so far…

Ura had tied Marianne up and was looking at him hopelessly.

Why couldn't any of the buttons have labels?

Just then his shell cell started to vibrate.


	38. Chp 37: Too Fast

**Chapter 37: Too Fast**

Mikey thought things were happening so fast, too fast. There was no time to think about anything. Things had go so terribly wrong, proving what Raph always said about the best laid plans. Yet he didn't have the time to wonder what had happened to Leo, whether or not Donnie, Kojirou, and Ura had been successful or captured, or what would happen to them next. He hardly even had the time to be scared, the monsters just appeared and then they had to try to survive. He didn't understand how such things could logically made, though he knew they abounded in games and movies. He didn't know anything that was going on. He didn't know why Karen said they should avoid contact with the monsters; he could hardly even register that Karen had been left in her bra. Maybe when all was said and done and they were back in the lair eating pizza and swapping stories, he could bring it up just to see Donnie go red, and he could ask Chad what he thought of him and his bros, and he could watch a lot of cartoons and happy things to blot out the memory of the monsters.

Come to think of it, the past few months themselves were all a blur.

Phase Two was indeed a city, and Mikey decided it was the creepiest thing he'd seen so far, hands down. The forest had been bizarre, unreal, but obviously fake. At no point had he forgotten that the environments were manufactured…well…almost.

_This though…it's not some counterfeit organic habitat; this is how it's _supposed _to look_. Thought Karen.

Two was several square blocks of a city at night. A town really, none of the buildings over three stories, but it _was_ a town—streetlights, curbs, stores, apartment houses, parked cars and asphalt streets.

There were only two things wrong with it, at least at first glance—the colors and the atmosphere. The buildings were all either brick red or a kind of dusky tan color; they looked unfinished, and the few parked cars that Karen could see all seemed to be black; it was hard to tell in the thick shadows.

"Spooky," Mikey said quietly, and Karen and Chad both nodded. Backs against the door, they surveyed the silent town and found it completely unnerving.

_Like a bad dream, one of those where you're lost and you can't find anyone and everything feels wrong_…

It wasn't like a ghost town, it didn't have the air of an abandoned place, a place that had outlived its usefulness; no one had ever lived there, no one ever would. No cars had driven down its streets, no children had played on its corners, no _life_ had called it home…and the blank, unlife feeling was—spooky.

The hatch had opened up onto a street that ran east to west, dead-ending just to their left in a wall painted midnight blue. From where they stood, the could see all the way down one wide, paved road that went south, ending in darkness some indeterminate distance ahead, a grid of intersecting streets along the way. The soft light from the streetlamps cast long shadows, just bright enough to see by and too dark to see clearly.

There was a car just in front of them, parked in front of a tan two-story structure. Raph walked across to it and rapped on its hood. Karen could hear the hollow _tink_ sound beneath his hand. Raph walked back, scanning the shadows warily.

They were all quiet for a moment, a profoundly uncomfortable silence that Chad finally broke, "So…ears and eyes open and stick close," he said tentatively, a question more than a statement.

Raph raised his eye ridges, smirking, "Not bad. Hey, what are you doing with your life if we make it outta here? Want to join the cause, stick it to the Rocket Gang?"

Chad grinned nervously, "If we make it out, ask me again."

As ready as they were going to be, they started south, walking slowly down the middle of the street, dark buildings watching them with blank glass eyes. Although all of them tried to move quietly, the empty town seemed to echo back the soft footfalls on asphalt, even their breathing. None of the buildings had signs or decorations, and there were no lights inside as far as Karen could tell. The oppressive, lifeless feeling gave her an unpleasant flash of her first day on the TEAM, her first mission.

About midway down the block, Mikey held up a hand, snapping Karen back to the present.

"Just a sec," He said, and jogged over to one of the "stores" on the left, a glass-fronted construct that reminded him of a pastry shop, the kind that always had wedding cakes in their windows. He peered through the glass, then tried the door. To his surprise, it opened; Mikey leaned inside for a long second, then closed it and jogged back.

"No counters or anything, but it's a real room," He said, his voice low, "There a back wall and a ceiling."

"Maybe the monsters are hidin' out in one of em."

_Yeah, more scared of us than we are of them, wouldn't that be nice. We should be so lucky—_

"That's it!' Chad said too loudly, then immediately dropped his voice, flushing. "How we can get out, maybe. The, uh, animals were all kept in cages or kennels or something behind the back walls. I don't know about the other phases, but there's a hall that runs around Two, I've seen the door to this one, it's maybe twenty feet from the southwest corner. It has to be easier than the exit; I mean, it'd be locked, but probably not reinforced."

Musashi was nodding, and Karen thought it sounded a lot more plausible than trying to get through a hatch bolted from the outside.

"Good," She said, "Good call. Let's see if we can—"

Something moved. Something in the shadows of a tan two-story building on the right, something that had them all aiming into the darkness, tense and alert. Ten seconds passed, then twenty—and whatever it was seemed to be holding perfectly still. Or…

…_or we didn't see anything at all._

"Nothing here," Musashi whispered, and Chad started to lower the nine-millimeter uncertainly, thinking that it had looked as though something was moving—

--And then something they couldn't see screamed, a shrill terrible shriek like some kind of feral beast in a blind rage—

--and the darkness itself moved—Karen still couldn't see it clearly, it was like a shadow, a part of a building that was in motion, but she saw the tiny shining eyes, light-colored and at least seven feet off the ground, the dark and ragged talons that nearly touched the asphalt, and she realized that it was a chameleon as it sprang toward them, still screaming.


	39. Chp 38: Phase 2

**Chapter 38: Phase Two**

Thanks to her special dark sprite abilities Marianne came to rather quickly.

Her gaze immediately moved to the screens. There was movement on one of them and she was excited and anxious to see them fallen and torn, bloodied masses on the pavement—

---and they weren't dead, not one of them, but Marianne saw it was only a matter of moments. All five were attacking one of the Hunters, and as she watched, a second loped on to the scene, still as black as the car it must have been standing by.

Orange spun to his right, shooting at the new threat, but the 3K wasn't to be put off by a few puny throwing stars; with a single massive leap, the Hunter closed the gap between them, twenty feet with one powerful thrust. They could do almost thirty, Marianne knew from the preliminary data—

--and now three of the others were assaulting it too, as Wings continued to blast at the first. It had taken a lot and it turned and sprang off the screen out of sight. The second was still a deep shining black, perfectly defined as it raised one muscular arm to swat at the projectiles hammering its body. A huge humanoid shape, the towering beast with the sloping reptilian skull and three-inch talons threw back its head and howled. Marianne knew the sound, her mind filling it in for the silently screaming creature as it started to disappear into the street, the match near perfect; as it swung its arm for Orange, Red was knocked sprawling instead. She didn't care who. They were all going down.

_Yes!_

Orange stepped in front of his fallen brother, as Fire pulled Red to his feet, the two backing away. There was some vocal interchange—

And the two and Cole ran off the screen, headed south…had the creature been hurt? The other two stopped and there was blood pouring from somewhere, covering the 3K's face, its chest—

--_eyes, must have hit its eyes!_ Marianne cursed harshly as it reeled and fell, not a fatal wound but one that would incapacitate it for a while.

Orange and Wings turned and ran after their companions, no other Hunters in sight. Not that it mattered, they were as good as dead; there was no way they could get through the city without being attacked, nowhere they could hide.

Marianne saw a door close; they were seeking sanctuary inside one of the stores. Marianne shook her head. That would probably shield them for five minutes, certainly no longer; the 3Ks had the strength to tear down the city, if they so chose, and hunted primarily by sense of smell. They'd track the cowards, track them and finally put an end to their troublemaking, useless lives.

* * *

They were in trouble, falling into the building and moving to the back wall through the dark, sweating and gasping, Chad expecting the flimsy door to crash open any second.

--_boom, and they come pouring in, screaming, clawing us to shreds before we even see them_—

"Man, I wish we could just cut wit' this playing around and get in close an' personal to finish 'em off. We've fought tougher opponents! We go all ninjitsu on those lousy, clawed geckos and it'll all be over in a cinch."

"I_hate_ distance fighting!" Musashi complained. "If we'd gone in close since the beginning this all would have been cake! They wouldn't even know what hit them before they were in a hundred pieces on the ground!"

"I know…I know…but the possibility of contagion is too great." Karen murmured, ejecting the clip from her semi to count the rounds. Five left…though Chad still had a couple clips—no, he only had one. Unless Karen was mistaken, Raph and Mikey had nine shuriken left, between the two of them.

Not good numbers considering each creature could withstand about twenty hits.

"Got a plan," Karen panted, and Chad felt a flicker of hope, a hope that lasted until her next sentence.

"We run like crazy for the back wall," She said firmly.

"Are you nuts?" Raph said, "Did ya see that one jump, there's no way we can outrun them—"

Karen took a deep breath and started talking, low and fast. "You're right, but you and I are good shots, we could take out some of the streetlights along the way. Even if they can see in the dark, it'll be a distraction, stir up some confusion maybe."

Raph didn't say anything, and although he couldn't see his face clearly, Musashi saw him rubbing at his shoulder where the creature had smacked him. Slowly, like he was actually considering Karen's idea.

_They're both nuts!_

Chad struggled to keep the blatant terror out of his voice. "Isn't there some other option? I mean, we could…we could climb and go across the rooftops."

Mikey smiled.

"Buildings are all different heights," Karen said, "And I don't think they're built to hold much weight—"

Mikey frowned.

"What if we—"

Karen interrupted softly, "We don't have much ammo, Chad."

"So we go back to Phase One, think it over…"

"We're closer to the southwest corner," Raph said, and Chad knew they were right, knew it and hated it, a lot. Still he searched for some other option, trying to think of some other way. The Hunters were terrible, and they were the most terrible things Chad thought he'd ever seen—

--And from somewhere outside, one of them screamed, the screeching, furious sound blasting through the thin walls, and Chad realized that they didn't have time to come up with another plan.

"Okay, yeah, okay," he said, thinking that the very least he could do would be to suck it up and face the inevitable like he actually had guts._ I won't drag them down,_ he thought, and took a deep breath, straightening his shoulders a little. If this was the way it had to be, he wasn't going to shame himself in front of them by turning into a sniveling coward—and he wasn't going to lower their chances by becoming a burden. Chad pulled the clip that Musashi had given him out of his pocket and fumbled through swapping it for the empty, his heart pounding—and was a little surprised to find that now he was committed, that the decision was made, he felt stronger, braver.

_I might very well die,_ he said to himself, and waited for the rush of horror—but it didn't come. He would have already been dead if it weren't for them, and maybe this would be his chance to keep one or all of them from getting hurt.

Without another word, the five of them moved for the door, Chad thinking that his life had changed more in the last couple of hours than in the last ten years—and that in spite of how it had come about, he was glad for the change. He felt whole. He felt _real_.

"Ready…" Musashi said, and Chad took a deep breath, Mikey grinning at him in the soft light from the window.

"…now!"

Musashi yanked the door open and they ran out into the street as all around them, the night was shattered by the savage screams of the Hunters.

* * *

Marianne's eyes glittered. She leaned forward, staring at the screen intently, delighted by the suicidal decision and oblivious to those around her. All five of them, storming out into the dark like lunatics. Like the dead who didn't have the sense to stop moving.

They ran south, Fire in the lead. From a sidewalk to their right, a Hunter leapt out to greet them—

--and there was a flash of light, a brilliant burst of white-orange high above, burning glass like glitter raining down across the street. One of the streetlamps, they'd shot out one of the lamps, and the 3K seemed to go mad as the broken glass pelted down over it. The red-turning-gray Hunter whipped its body around, frenzied and screaming, searching for its attacker—

--and completely ignored the running people. All five were sprinting past, raising weapons, firing into the sky. Firing at more of the lights, and Marianne, saw another Hunter spring out into the street, almost lost as a shadow among shadows. And Cole, Chad _Cole_ feinted left then right, slamming the barrel of his gun against the crouching 3Ks head—and there was a burst of liquid, of brain and blood projectile gushing from its temple, the electrician firing at point blank range. The Hunter's arms and legs were spasming, failing, but it was already dead. Cole jumped away and kept running, catching up to the others as more of the streetlights exploded, glass flying from strobing flashes of white light.

"No." Marianne whispered, unaware that she'd spoken but quite aware that things were going horribly wrong.


	40. Chp 39: Price

**Chapter 39: Price**

Raph ran; the violent shrieks chased them, the rain of glass and smell of burning metal was coming at them from everywhere.

And he saw one of them in the street, in front of them at the intersection that would take them to the cage, saw the strange flashing eyes and the open black hole of its screaming mouth.

He smirked and kept running straight at it, the screaming monster less than ten feet away he whipped out his sai, throwing it directly into the howling, unnatural face.

But it didn't go down, and although he swerved to avoid it, he didn't get far enough. Its screeching face seemed only inches from his, visible, thick with blood, it swung one impossibly long arm out and slammed it into him.

The blow crashed into his plastron, and Raph expected to be crushed, thrown through the air, his body shattered—but the creature must have been weakened, disorientated, blinded perhaps, because though he could feel his muscles contracting in pain—the strike had been brutally solid—he'd taken harder punches. He'd staggered but didn't fall, and then he was yanking his sai back, turning left, headed west.

He shot a look back and saw the others still with him, looked ahead—"There it is!"

Remarkably only now did Marianne notice that the two with her in the control room had been joined by another turtle man. Apparently he'd been in there for some time probably discussing some "master plan" to save their raggedy friends. Being lost in her own little world, she had no idea what he was planning, but he was at the control box studying the wires as if he knew what he was doing.

Her eyes widened then narrowed, "They're dead! They're dead!" She yelled, focusing all her energy and smiling nastily. Her eyes glowed and bat wings broke out of her back, snapping the ropes. She charged for the unsuspecting purple-banded arrival just as he found the main power cord, arms out greedily. Only to be blind sighted by the cat. But Marianne soon found her footing, grabbed the pest by the neck and threw her to the side against the wall, turning her attention upon the blue turtle and the consoles. She'd make it—he was too far too stop her. "You're _all_ dead!" She screamed fanatically, throwing herself forward and jabbing at a certain button.

The next second she fell over dead, Dernier Vancour piercing her heart.

Ura stood, rubbing her head and emotionlessly walking over to retrieve her sword.

"Don, what did she do?" Leo asked, fighting the rising panic as he noticed lights flashing red.

Before he could open his mouth a cool recorded female voice sounded over the intercom: _"The self-destruct sequence has been activated. All personnel should evacuate the premises immediately."_

They all turned their faces to the screens desperately.

* * *

The street ended at the painted wall less than a block ahead—and there was an opening about five feet off the ground, a hole eight feet wide and at least ten feet high.

There was another scream to their right, Musashi couldn't see the camouflaged Hunter but _bam-bam_, Karen or Chad shot at it, the shriek going frantic with rage. Musashi casually raised her hand and 'shot' fire, taking out another streetlight, _ten seconds and we're there_!

And a panel of deep blue wall started to slide down over the opening, slow but steady. In seconds, there'd be no escape.

There was a Hunter less than twenty feet behind them, gaining ground, its massive body flickering between tan and asphalt, its claws scraping gouges in the street.

Mikey and Musashi made it through the opening, Raph did too, hands hitting the bottom, vaulting him through in a graceful blur. One hand shot out and Karen was there, grabbing it, being jerked inside in an instant—

And there was Chad, he was going to make it through, too, there were hands reaching out to him—and then the Hunter behind him swept its arm down, its talons ripping into Chad's back, through the shirt and skin, through muscle, perhaps through bone.

The others swept Chad inside as the gate settled closed.

* * *

Kojirou shook his head as he stepped towards the isolated (apparently) one-story structure. Donatello hadn't stayed put, and that was either a sign of direct disregard or immense danger for those inside.

Dawn would be breaking soon.

They'd been gone too long. Something must have happened.

He collected himself and sat upon the ground, beginning to concentrate.

* * *

Chad didn't scream as they set him down, though he must have been in agony. They placed him on his stomach as gently as they could, Mikey feeling sick with sorrow when he saw the shredded mess that had been Chad's back.

_Dying, he's dying._

In seconds, he lay in a pool of his own blood. Through the tatters of his wet, crimson shirt, Karen could see the ripped flesh, the torn muscle fibers, and the slick shine of bone beneath. The crushed bone. She looked away quickly. The damage had been done in two long, ragged tears, each starting above the shoulder blades and ending at his lower back. Mortal wounds.

Chad was breathing low, shallow gasps, his eyes closed, his hands trembling.

Unconscious. Karen looked at Raph, saw the stricken expression, looked away; there was nothing they could do for him.

They were in a giant mesh cage that stank of wild animal at the end of a long cement hall, one that apparently ran the length of the three testing areas. It was dark, only a few lights on, revealing the kennel in shadows; the cages were separated by partition walls with huge windows, and Musashi could see the one next to them, the Spitters' home. It was covered in thick, clear plastic, the floor littered with bones.

The Hunters' cage was empty, at least thirty feet wide and twice as long, a couple of low troughs at the mesh walls. It was a cold and lonely place to die, but at least he was out, he wasn't feeling any—

"_There are now two minutes to detonation."_

* * *

"I've found a layout of the base." Don said quietly, managing to keep calm despite the disarming alarm blaring.

"Good." Said Leo, looking at the paper before charging out of the room and down the hall, "We're heading to their location now! And we'll make it out together!"

"Or die together." Ura said to herself before following after them.

"_There are now 50 seconds to detonation."_


	41. Chp 40: Immediate Outcome

**Chapter 40: Immediate Outcome**

The fresh scent of silver needle tea filled Splinter's sleeping quarters by the time he'd taken the first few sips. Each of the lit candles threw a dancing light that made every shadowy corner in the room quiver with life.

The lair was empty and simply too vast for an elderly rat alone, which was why he retreated to his room with his tea and thoughts, blocking out the large space on the outside and what was missing in it. As always his students were out dealing with the darkness that plagued the world, and Splinter found himself alone in his home, trying to best come to terms with his concerns.

He was not the youth he once was. However the loss of strength and agility didn't sadden him as he had gained a kind of wisdom that came only with age. Yet at the moment, it was no comfort as he found his attention wandering to the scrapbook upon the small table in front of him that was filled with various memories to tell the story of his students' lives.

He caught one of the tea lights briefly flare in struggle, bathing the room with its distressed light, before dying with a silent puff as the wick drowned. For a moment, he just watched as the gray smoke rose and slowly evaporated among the steel pipes and wires up under the ceiling.

He got up and bent down to pick up the tea light that had just extinguished itself and held it in his paw as he wondered if his students were safe. It wouldn't have been the first time their adversaries had shown that they were fond of the element of surprise and lacking in honor. Thus he accepted that any small task his students attended to might end up larger than any of them imagined.

Disregarding the thought, he also let the now cold tea light fall from his hand into the wicker basket that served as his bin. He always hated the wait. He always ended up with the internal struggle if there was something he hadn't taught them that that needed to know in order to survive their ordeal. Regardless if his intellect knew there was no more he could possibly teach them that they were ready to handle, he kept tormenting himself with the thought of "what if". A parent's privilege.

Calmly, he knelt in front of the writing desk and found a drawer where he collected a tea light before closing it shut. As he lit the replacement and put it on the plate among the others, he swallowed his concern as best he could. But so many hours had passed that he could no longer force himself to be calm and medication was of no avail against the demons of his thoughts. In those moments he could imagine what it would be like to see only three of his sons come home.

His mind conjured the sickest of all images as he walked to find a seat back on his futon. He was unable to find the strength to keep his own mind from turning against him. He'd taught his students well, and even if there were those among the four who were better than the rest, they were all capable of defeating their foes. They had proven this over and over again. As individuals they all had their flaws, some big and some small, but as a group those flaws were met with one of the other's strength.

Yet his mind did not let go of the disturbing scene it played before him. He had lost count of the variety of that he had imagined when sitting like this in ignorance. There were those scenarios in which one of his sons was returned to him dead; however, painful those were, it was not that which bothered him the most. What really scared him in such lonely hours was a scene that hardly differed from each time it came back to haunt him. When he did not hear the sounds of joy and victory but panicked cries. He found himself letting go of everything that he was doing, even leaving his walking stick behind, to hurry as fast as his old legs could carry him to greet his sons. And three sons were always carrying the fourth. Fear clutched around his heart so he found it hard to breathe. The terror that hit him when he realized that his fourth son was mortally wounded—that he could not be of any aid—was the sickest trick his mind played on him.

He closed his eyes tightly as he felt the helplessness swallow him when he had to watch his son die. To see his eyes begging for his father and protector to make him better, to make the pain go away. To idly stand by to watch the life he had raised fade away under his own hands was far worse than knowing they had died bravely on the battlefield…

The silver needle tea on his table had long gone cold, but the aroma still filled the room. He tried to focus on it to rid the horrid image of the blind trust in his son's eyes which turned into bitter disappointment and faded away.

"_It's good to be home after kickin' butt._"

His ears perked by the sound of a familiar voice. At the same time that he established that the voice was truly Raphael's and not just a figment of his imagination, his heart started to raze in his chest.

"_So. Were those pocket monsters?_"

He walked slowly to the door, picking out each of their voices, tired, humorless, and strained but real.

"_No, Michelangelo. At least I hope not._"

"_It's a shame about Chad. He was a nice guy and so close to escaping too. He didn't deserve it."_

"_At least he died with honor."_

"_Hey Kojirou, thanks for the pick-up; it was gettin' close for a minute there._"

Splinter waited by the door until he was calm enough to go out and meet them. He might not have been able to go with them on all their missions, but he knew better than to think it made him of no use. He was the one they turned to for support, for a listener, and simply for a pillar of strength in trouble. No matter what, they were still his students and there were things he would be there to teach them—at least for now.

"_Well, guys. We did it. We actually did it._"

"_Eh, you didn't really think we'd lose, Kar, did ya? It was fun; I could go for that sort of adventure every other day…except for the ally dying part…poor guy._"

"_In the United States, the Gang is defeated. We stopped them, and put an end to their experiments and monsters. Yukina and Chad are avenged."_

In a moment, Splinter would go out to patch up their hopefully shallow wounds as he listened to them re-enact the story for the old man who had to be left behind. He'd go out to greet them, scowl at them for taking risks, and praise them for doing good…

* * *

"I think the plan worked perfectly." Said Warui, not bothering to look up from _Don Quixote_. Marianne was dead and gone. The Rocket Gang also had mostly all gone home, having concluded the deal. "Your enemies believe the grievous blow they dealt the Dan is the reason for their withdrawal. They have their guard lowered. It will soon be time to mess with their emotions. By utilizing plans that will aim for their hearts you hold the key to success." She momentarily put her book down and emotionlessly looked over Stockman's inventions, "Well enough, I suppose. Not only will aiming for the heart destroy their morale, messing with their heads will also give us insight as how to best deal with them in our final plans. I myself have a plan or two that I wish to enact, but I shall allow Stockman the first move." _Save the best for last_, she thought to herself. 


	42. Epilogue

**Epilogue:**

"I'm telling you, Michelangelo. It's a science consisting of exact measures and specific conditions; make an alteration in the equation and you produce variants in the whole formula."

"Karen, no You're making my brain hurt." Mikey whined, "It's _so_ not a science. It's an artsy expression. There's freedom to do whatever makes you happy. Cooking should be a joy, flavors should sing, the chef should be skipping through a field of daisies with the sun shining and stuff."

"I'll allow you that. Perhaps we shall call it an art and a science."

"Yeah, sure, fine." Mikey grumbled good-naturedly, looking for the spatula to frost the cake they'd both worked on with butter cream, "Anything to make me suffer."

She grinned, taking a pile of plates out of Ura's hand and placing them in the sink then taking off one of Mikey's crazy frilly aprons. The dishes would have to be washed if the group wanted to eat dessert civilly upon plates with forks. Donnie silently entered the kitchen and started the task, despite Karen's protests. Finally, she settled on drying them while chatting with him.

Ura stood, leaning upon the kitchen doorframe, from which she had a perfect view of both parties in the kitchen and in the "dining room".

Two months had passed since they'd crushed the grassroots campaign of the Rocket Gang in New York, and they had had a big dinner celebration thing, just because.

Leo, Raph, Splinter, Casey, April, Kojirou, and Musashi still sat at the table, all calm and relaxing-like. Reminded her of the first meal she'd had with the turtles.

She closed her eyes.

"The food was great guys! Be sure to thank Karen and Mikey for us." April started, smiling cheerily and standing. "Unfortunately we won't be able to stay for dessert."

"What? Whaddya mean, April?" Casey sputtered.

"We have an important prior engagement."

"Huh? Oh, c'mon, can't it wait?"

"No Casey Jones. You know how important it is to me."

"Oh fine." He grouched, "Hey I'll see you guys around. And be sure to save some of that cake for me."

Mikey, Karen, and Don happened to come out to bid them goodbye.

Soon the lair turned to a happy silence.

"So…we did it." Karen started, distributing the plates methodically. "All dan'in were defeated or arrested and convicted since."

The silence turned curious for some, and subtly dread-filled for a few others.

"Well. I know I said it before but I just want to thank you all again for your help."

They knew she was getting at something, even the most oblivious knew.

"During the time we were here you guys never ceased to amaze us with your caring and strength and honor. You're great warriors and have become our best friends." She had finished with the plates and was now fiddling with her hands, "Um, I guess what I'm trying to say is that you guys will always be in our hearts…no matter how far apart we are physically."

"Wait. Are you trying to say you're leaving us?" Mikey asked, tone broken.

"Well, we did what we were assigned to do. And now our superiors want us back home."

A not so happy silence ensued.

"Um, anyway…we just wanted to give you something." She muttered quickly reaching for something in her pocket.

"We don't want anything from you." Leo was the only one able to find his voice.

"No, no, really, take it, it's a gift." She said, holding an envelope out to him; when he refused to make a move for it, she went ahead and grabbed his hand, firmly placing it in his palm.

She went back into the kitchen. Musashi raised an eyebrow and pretended to study her fork uncomfortably. Ura looked away. Kojirou sat still rather happy looking, raising a drink to his lips.

Leo sighed and decided to open the envelope. To his surprise five tickets fell out—obviously fake, designed to look like plane tickets…

Karen came back in, "So, you guys up for a vacation?" She asked, façade of sorrow displaced by beaming mischievousness.

They all just stared.

"What?"

"Why don't you all come with us? Visit Nomékop—it'll be okay! It's safer for you there than here, and it's a private plane, and you guys can stay in a nice place, and get pampered, and relax!" She was near beside herself with motioning arms and spinning around.

"Uh, well." Leo looked to his brothers and then his sensei. "I—we…"

She held up her hands giggling and backing away, "I know, I know. You guys need more time to make your decision and all that. But I so know if you come with us, you won't regret it!"

Raph looked at Karen as if she lost her head; then he glared at Musashi to see if she was in on it too, but she had her back to him. He nudged her, and she merely fell over, hugging herself, shoulders shaking, trying to keep it in. Mikey merely stared at Karen with his mouth open, unable to believe that she'd pulled such a trick—he'd totally missed the whole 'why don't you come to Nomékop for vacation' part. Leo still looked confused and bewildered as if he didn't know what emotion he was supposed to be feeling at the moment, an uncommon look for him that Ura couldn't help but smile at. Don was wondering about what possibilities such a land could hold and what he could possibly expect there.

Splinter sat calmly, a gentle smile on his face. If he had been surprised he hardly showed it.

Soon everyone was looking to him for some sort of sign of approval or disapproval.

He stood, with an 'excuse me' and left the table, leaving all gawking after him.

"Master Splinter, aren't you going to tell us what we should do?"

"I leave that choice to you, Leonardo. But entertain our guests for now." He turned and entered his room, "I have some packing to do."

-Fin

* * *

(_My dearest readers, your pardon I beg for every mistake and error, every cliché and meaningless line. I hope the lengthy passage has provided you with some amusement one way or another and I thank you for coming so far. The likeness of any major oc may be found and viewed in various areas of my 'homepage'_) 


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